Representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of men they describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with the absolute truth.
I tore myself away from the safe comfort of certainties through my love for truth - and truth rewarded me.
…but all day long I would be training myself to think, to understand, to criticize, to know myself; I was seeking for the absolute truth: this preoccupation did not exactly encourage polite conversati...
To abstain from politics is in itself a political attitude.
One is not born a woman - one becomes one.
What do you believe in ?""People's sufferings, and the fact that it is abominable. One should do everything to abolish it. To tell you the truth, nothing else seems to me of any importance.
My contemplation is an excruciation only because it is also a joy.
If you live long enough you'll see that every victory turns into a defeat.
One is not born a genius one becomes a genius.
أكثر ما كان يجذبني إليه ضحكته: فكأنما سقط، من غير انتظار، على كوكب ليس هو كوكبه، فأخذ يكتشف طرافته العجيبة. و حين كانت ضحكته تنفجر، كان كل شيء يبدو لي جديداً، أخاذاً، رائعاً.
When I was a child, when I was an adolescent, books saved me from despair: that convinced me that culture was the highest of values[...].
The misfortune is that although everyone must come to [death], each experiences the adventure in solitude. We never left Maman during those last days... and yet we were profoundly separated from her.
Alone: for the first time I understood the terrible significance of that word. Alone without a witness, without anyone to speak to, without refuge. The breath in my body, the blood in my veins, all th...
It's not a very big step from contentment to complacency.
Why one man rather than another? It was odd. You find yourself involved with a fellow for life just because he was the one that you met when you were nineteen.
Whether you think of it as heavenly or as earthly, if you love life immortality is no consultation for death.
Man must not attempt to dispel the ambiguity of his being but, on the contrary, accept the task of realizing it.
Because we are separated everything separates us, even our efforts to join each other.
And yet we are told that femininity is in danger; we are exhorted to be women, remain women, become women. It would appear, then, that every female human being is not necessarily a woman; to be so con...
If you haven't been happy very young you can still be happy later on but it's much harder. You need more luck.