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Marcel Proust

Marcel Proust Quotes

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Famous Marcel Proust Quotes

“The truth has no need to be uttered to be made apparent, and ... one may perhaps gather it with more certainty, without waiting for words and without even taking any account of them, from countless outward signs, even from certain invisible phenomena, analogous in the sphere of human character to what atmospheric changes are in the physical world.”

WorldNeedsHumansMayMadeCharacterTruthCertainWaitingAccountsInvisibleCertaintySpheres
Book:In Search of Lost Time, Volume III: The Guermantes Way
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“There is no man ... however wise, who has not at some period of his youth said things, or lived a life, the memory of which is so unpleasant to him that he would gladly expunge it. And yet he ought not entirely to regret it, because he cannot be certain that he has indeed become a wise man -- so far as it is possible for any of us to be wise -- unless he has passed through all the fatuous or unwholesome incarnations by which that ultimate stage must be preceded.”

MenSaidWisdomCertainMemoriesWiseStageYouthRegretOughtPeriodsUltimateIncarnationBeing Wise
Book:In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower: In Search of Lost Time
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“Daughters of the attitude that produced them, certain women will not appeal to us without the double bed in which we find peace by their side, while others, to be caressed with a more secret intention, require leaves blown by the wind, water rippling in the dark, things as light and fleeting as they are.”

LightCertainWomenSidesWaterDarkSecretAttitudeWindBedDaughterIntentionAppealsFleetingFinding PeaceDark Things
Book:In Search of Lost Time Volume III The Guermantes Way
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“Certain favourite roles are played by us so often before the public and rehearsed so carefully when we are alone that we find it easier to refer to their fictitious testimony than to that of a reality which we have almost entirely forgotten.”

RealityCertainRolesEasierForgottenFavouriteTestimony
Book:In Search of Lost Time, Volume II: Within a Budding Grove (A Modern Library E-Book)
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“After a certain age our memories are so intertwined with one another that what we are thinking of, the book we are reading, scarcely matters any more. We have put something of ourselves everywhere, everything is fertile, everything is dangerous, and we can make discoveries no less precious than in Pascal's Pensées in an advertisement for soap.”

ThinkingBookMatterAgeCertainReadingMemoriesDangerousDiscoveryPensSoapOur MemoriesFertileAdvertisementsIntertwinedPascal
Book:The captive, The fugitive
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“It seems that certain transcendental realities emit rays to which the masses are sensitive. That is how, for example, when an event takes place, when at the front an army is in danger, or defeated, or victorious, the rather obscure news which the cultivated man does not quite understand, excite in the masses an emotion which surprises him and in which, once the experts have informed him of the actual military situation, he recognizes the populace's perception of that "aura" surrounding great events and visible for hundreds of kilometers.”

MenDoeWarRealitySeemsCertainEmotionSituationMilitaryFrontsEventsDangerExamplePerceptionNewsMassArmySurpriseCrowdsSensitiveExpertsVisibleRaysDefeatedObscureTranscendentalAurasGreat Events
Author:Marcel Proust
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“For women who do not love us, as for the "disappeared", knowing that we no longer have any hope does not prevent us form continuing to wait. We live on our guard, on watch; women whose son has gone asea on a dangerous exploration imagine at any minute, although it has long been certain that he has perished, that he will enter, miraculously saved, and healthy.”

LoveLongDoeFormDeathCertainHopeWaitingWatchesGoneKnowingImagineMinutesDangerousSonHealthySavedExplorationContinuing
Author:Marcel Proust
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“At a certain age, we have already been struck by love; it no longer develops alone, according to its own mysteries and fateful laws while our hearts stand by startled and passive. We come to its assistanceRecognizing one of its symptoms, we recall, we bring back to life the others. Since we possess its song engraved in its totality within us, we do not need for a woman to tell us the beginning--filled with admiration inspired by beauty--to find the continuation.”

NeedsHeartAgeLawCertainSongMysteryExperienceFilledInspiredAdmirationRecallsPassiveSymptomsTotalityContinuationEngraved
Author:Marcel Proust
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“There is probably not one person, however great his virtue, who cannot be led by the complexities of life's circumstances to a familiarity with the vices he condemns the most vehemently--without his completely recognizing this vice which, disguised as certain events, touches him and wounds him: strange words, an inexplicable attitude, on a given night, of the person whom he otherwise has so many reasons to love.”

PersonsReasonNightCertainGivenAttitudeVirtueEventsStrangeCircumstancesVicesWoundsToleranceComplexityRecognizingFamiliarityInexplicableReason To Love
Author:Marcel Proust
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“The reason why life may be judged to be trivial although at certain moments it seems to us so beautiful is that we form our judgment, ordinarily, not on the evidence of life itself but of those quite different images which preserve nothing of life-and therefore we judge it disparagingly.”

MayDifferentReasonMomentsSeemsBeautifulFormCertainJudgingJudgmentEvidencePreservesReason WhyJudged
Book:In Search of Lost Time, Volume VI: Time Regained (A Modern Library E-Book)
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“The great renunciation of old age as it prepared for death, wraps itself up in its chrysalis, which may be observed at the end of lives that are at all prolonged, even in old lovers who have lived for one another, in old friends bound by the closest ties of mutual sympathy, who, after a certain year, cease to make the necessary journey or even to cross the street to see one another, cease to correspond, and know that they will communicate no more in this world.”

KnowsWorldYearsMayEndsAgeCertainJourneyStreetsThis WorldLoversCrossesPreparedBoundsCommunicateCeaseOld AgeTiesMutualClosestWrapsOld FriendsRenunciationEnd Of LifeOld LoveChrysalis
Book:In Search of Lost Time, Volume I: Swann's Way (A Modern Library E-Book)
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“Reading is at the threshold of spiritual life; it can introduce us to it; it does not constitute it. There are, however, certain cases, certain pathological cases, so to speak, of spiritual depression in which reading can become a sort of curative discipline and assume the task, through repeated stimulation, of continuously reintroducing a lazy mind into the life of the spirit.”

MindDoeSpiritualSpiritCertainReadingCasesDisciplineLazySpiritual LifeIntroducingThreshold
Author:Marcel Proust
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“The soldier is convinced that a certain indefinitely extendable time period is accorded him before he is killed, the burglar before he is caught, men in general, before they must die. That is the amulet which preserves individuals — and sometimes populations — not from danger, but from the fear of danger, in reality from the belief in danger, which in some cases allows them to brave it without being brave. Such a confidence, just as unfounded, supports the lover who counts on a reconciliation, a letter.”

MenSometimesRealityCertainDiesIndividualBeliefCasesSupportDangerLoversPeriodsLettersBraveSoldierCaughtPopulationConvincedPreservesReconciliationBurglarsTime PeriodsAmulets
Author:Marcel Proust
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“Now the same mystery which often veils from our eyes the reason for a catastrophe envelops just as frequently, when love is in question, the suddenness of certain happy solutions, such as had been brought to me by Gilberte's letter. Happy, or at least seemingly happy, for there are few that can really be happy when we are dealing with a sentiment of such a kind that any satisfaction we can give it does no more, as a rule, than dislodge some pain. And yet sometimes a respite is granted us, and we have for a little while the illusion of being healed.”

GivingKindLittlesDoeSometimesReasonEyePainCertainLove IsMysterySolutionsIllusionLettersSatisfactionGrantedSentimentsCatastropheVeilsHealedRespite
Book:Remembrance of Things Past: Swann's way. Within a budding grove
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“The places we have known do not belong solely to the world of space in which we situate them for our greater convenience. They were only a thin slice among contiguous impressions which formed our life at that time; the memory of a certain image is but regret for a certain moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fleeting, alas, as the years.”

WorldYearsMomentsCertainHouseMemoriesSpaceKnownGreaterOur LivesRegretImpressionAlasFleetingAvenuesConvenience
Book:In Search of Lost Time: The Way by Swann's
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“We say that the hour of death cannot be forecast, but when we say this we imagine that hour as placed in an obscure and distant future. It never occurs to us that it has any connection with the day already begun or that death could arrive this same afternoon, this afternoon which is so certain and which has every hour filled in advance.”

DeathCertainHoursImagineDyingConnectionsFilledGrievingDestinationAfternoonDeath And DyingImagine ThatObscureAfter DeathForecastsDying DeathSomeone DyingDying LoveFinal DestinationDeath And LossCertain DeathFilled InSomeone Who Is DyingShort DeathPreparing For Death
Author:Marcel Proust
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“A certain similarity exists, although the type evolves, between all the women we love, a similarity that is due to the fixity of our own temperament, which it is that chooses them, eliminating all those who would not be at once our opposite and our complement, fitted that is to say to gratify our senses and to wring our heart.”

HeartCertainTypeOppositesDuesSensesEvolveTemperamentSimilarityEliminatingComplement
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Marcel Proust (Illustrated)
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“When we have passed a certain age, the soul of the child that we were and the souls of the dead from whom we sprang come and shower upon us their riches and their spells, asking to be allowed to contribute to the new emotions which we feel and in which, erasing their former image, we recast them in an original creation.”

FeelsChildrenSoulAgeCertainEmotionCreationAskingOriginalsRichesFormerSpellsShowers
Book:Remembrance of Things Past: The captive. The fugitive. Time regained
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“Life is extraordinarily suave and sweet with certain natural, witty, affectionate people who have unusual distinction and are capable of every vice, but who make a display of none in public and about whom no one can affirm they have a single one. There is something supple and secret about them. Besides, their perversity gives spice to their most innocent occupations, such as taking a walk in the garden at night.”

PeopleGivingLife IsNightCertainNaturalWalksSecretVirtueSweetCapableGardenVicesWittyInnocentDistinctionOccupationUnusualDisplaySpicesAffectionateSupplePerversitySuave
Book:Pleasures and days: and other writings
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