Albert Camus
But there is in every man a profound instinct which is neither that of destruction nor that of creation. It is merely a matter of resembling nothing. — Albert Camus, The Minotaur (1939)
Category: French Literature
Paul Celan
And the too much of my speaking:heaped up round the littlecrystal dressed in the style of your silence. — Paul Celan, from “Below,” Poetry Magazine December 1971
Victor Hugo
The soul that loves and suffers is in the sublime state. ― Victor Hugo, Les Misérables (A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven & Cie. 1862)
Charles Baudelaire
I love to watch the fine mist of the night come on,The windows and the stars illumined, one by one,The rivers of dark smoke pour upward lazily,And the moon rise and turn them silver. I shall seeThe springs, the summers, and the autumns slowly pass;And when old Winter puts his blank face to the glass,I… Continue reading Charles Baudelaire
Maylis de Kerangal
They said: okay, it’s true, time is nothing to him, that which passes, that which flies, all that is nothing to him, doesn’t slip past or cause adherences or brackish fog – and is it precisely because we are alone in time, alone and losing at every turn, noses buried in our losses, in the… Continue reading Maylis de Kerangal
Albert Camus
There are some individuals who have too strong a craving, a will, and a nostalgia for happiness ever to reach it. They always retain a bitter and passionate aftertaste, and that’s the best they can hope for. — Albert Camus, Correspondence, 1932-1960. (University of Nebraska Press; annotated edition edition May 1, 2003)
Marcel Proust
Love is a striking example of how little reality means to us.— Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time, Volume VI: Time Regained. (Modern Library; Rev Sub edition November 1, 2000) Originally published 1927.
Marguerite Yourcenar
I was willing to yield to nostalgia, that melancholy residue of desire. — Marguerite Yourcenar, Memoirs of Hadrian, transl. Grace Frick (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2005)
Paul Celan
What is returning?Nearly nothing, but it could be a snowflake — Paul Celan, “Questions & Answers,” Romanian Poems (Green Integer, 2003)
Paul Éluard
[The curve of your eyes] La courbe de tes yeux fait le tour de mon coeur,Un rond de danse et de douceur,Auréole du temps, berceau nocturne et sûr,Et si je ne sais plus tout ce que j’ai vécuC’est que tes yeux ne m’ont pas toujours vu. Feuilles de jour et mousse de rosée,Roseaux du vent,… Continue reading Paul Éluard
The Vale of Soul-Making 