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Soul Quotes

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Soul Quotes

“The good critic is he who relates the adventures of his soul among masterpieces.”

Art Soul Literature Adventure Criticism Critics Relate Masterpiece

Author:Anatole France

“Russian literature saved my soul. When I was a young girl in school and I asked what is good and what is evil, no one in that corrupt system could show me.”

Soul Shows School Young Girl Evil Literature Saved My Soul Show Me Russian Literature

Author:Irina Ratushinskaya

“Sex is the ... tremulous and bewildering and nerve-racking and delicious and myriad-adjectived soul-condition ... generally known as love. Ninety-nine point nine repeater percent of the world's literature has been devoted to its analysis. It's therefore of some importance.”

World Has Beens Soul Literature Sex Known Conditions Percent Importance Nine Analysis Nerves Devoted Delicious Ninety Ninety Nine

Author:William John Locke

“People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. They will practice Indian yoga and all its exercises, observe a strict regimen of diet, learn the literature of the whole world - all because they cannot get on with themselves and have not the slightest faith that anything useful could ever come out of their own souls.”

People World Soul Matter Whole Order Literature Practice Exercise Yoga Whole World Absurd Indian Diets Strict Memories Dreams Reflections

Author:Carl Jung

“In a general way, the literature of the twentieth century is essentially psychological; and psychology consists of describing states of the soul by displaying them all on the same plane, without any discrimination of value, as though good and evil were external to them, as though the effort toward the good could be absent at any moment from the thought of any man.”

Men Way Soul States Moments Values Evil Literature Effort Psychology Century Discrimination Psychological Planes Good And Evil Twentieth Century Absent Describing

Author:Simone Weil

“By complex ways, by looking deep into the dark well of the human soul, full of filth, somewhere at the very bottom of it Chekhov at last found his faith. And this faith turned out to be faith in man, in the power of human progress. And man became his god.”

Men Way Inspirational Humans Wells Art Soul Lasts Found Literature Dark Progress Complexes Bottom Human Soul Filth Human Progress Chekhov

Author:Yevgeny Zamyatin

“States of soul rightly expressed, as the poet expresses them in moments of pure inspiration, retain forever the power of creating like states. It is this that makes genuine literature a vital force.”

Soul States Moments Inspiration Literature Force Forever Poet Pure Creating Genuine

Book:Aphorisms and Reflections: Conduct, Culture and Religion

Source: Aphorisms and Reflections: Conduct, Culture and Religion

“For the judging of contemporary literature the only test is one's personal taste. If you much like a new book, you must call it literature even though you find no other soul to agree with you, and if you dislike a book you must declare that it is not literature though a million voices should shout you that you are wrong. The ultimate decision will be made by Time.”

Source: The March of Literature: From Confucius' Day to Our Own

“The destination of the soul: this is what I, led on by Nils Holgersson, came to seek in the literature of Western Europe. I fervently hope that my pursuit, as a Japanese, of literature and culture will, in some small measure, repay Western Europe for the light it has shed upon the human condition.”

Humans Soul Light Culture Literature Conditions Europe Western Pursuit Destination Human Condition Shed Western Europe

Author:Kenzaburo Oe

“The writings of women are always cold and pretty like themselves. There is as much wit as you may desire, but never any soul.”

Writing May Soul Desire Literature Cold Wit

Author:Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“There is nothing so charming as the knowledge of literature; of that branch of literature, I mean, which enables us to discover the infinity of things, the immensity of Nature, the heavens, the earth, and the seas; this is that branch which has taught us religion, moderation, magnanimity, and that has rescued the soul from obscurity; to make her see all things above and below, first and last, and between both; it is this that furnishes us wherewith to live well and happily, and guides us to pass our lives without displeasure and without offence.”

“Never can a new idea move within the law. It matters not whether that idea pertains to political and social changes or to any other domain of human thought and expression - to science, literature, music; in fact, everything that makes for freedom and joy and beauty must refuse to move within the law. How can it be otherwise? The law is stationary, fixed, mechanical, 'a chariot wheel' which grinds all alike without regard to time, place and condition, without ever taking into account cause and effect, without ever going into the complexity of the human soul.”

“Conflict is the soul of literature.”

Soul Literature Conflict

Book:What Do Women Want?: Essays by Erica Jong

Source: What Do Women Want?: Essays by Erica Jong