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Conquest of the useless: reflections from the making of Fitzcarraldo

Book by Werner Herzog · 5 quotes · Long, Said, Werner Herzog

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Conquest of the useless: reflections from the making of Fitzcarraldo Quotes

“For a moment the feeling crept over me that my work, my vision, is going to destroy me, and for a fleeting moment I let myself take a long, hard look at myself, something I would not otherwise do--out of instinct, on principle, out of self-preservation--look at myself with objective curiosity to see whether my vision has not destroyed me already. I found it comforting to note that I was still breathing.”

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Book:Conquest of the useless: reflections from the making of Fitzcarraldo
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“Am I in the wrong place here, or in the wrong life? Did I not recognize, as I sat in a train that raced past a station and did not stop, that I was on the wrong train, and did I not learn from the conductor that the train would not stop at the next station, either, a hundred kilometers away, and did he not also admit to me, whispering with his hand shielding his mouth, that the train would not stop again at all?”

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“Ich las die Übersetzung des Piaveschen Librettos zu Ernani, herausgegeben in Zürich 1952, und im Vorwort steht in atemberaubender Dummheit, man habe die krassesten Unglaubwürdigkeiten ausgemerzt, wo doch gerade das Unfaßbare das Schöne an der Geschichte ist, oder besser: an der Gattung Oper an sich, weil gerade was von keiner auch noch so exotischen Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung mehr erfaßbar ist, in der Oper zu einer machtvollen Verwandlung der ganzen Welt in Musik als das Natürliche erscheint. Auch die großen Gefühle der Oper, die oft als übersteigert abgetan werden, kommen mir eher in die Gegenrichtung aufs äußerste reduziert vor, auf das Archetypische der Gefühle verdichtet, nicht mehr weiter in ihrer Essenz konzentrierbar. Es sind Axiome von Gefühlen. Das ist es, was Oper und Dschungel verbindet.”

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Book:Conquest of the useless: reflections from the making of Fitzcarraldo
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