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Quotes by Czechoslovakian Authors
"When a truth is not given complete freedom, freedom is not complete."
"It was a great thing to be a human being. It was something tremendous. Suddenly I'm conscious of a million sensations buzzing in me like bees in a hive. Gentlemen, it was a great thing."
"Socialism is good when it comes to wages, but it tells me nothing when it comes to other questions in life that are more private and painful, for which I must seek answers elsewhere."
"I would like to see it go back to the wood racquets. To see the touch put back in tennis."
"The beauty of New York rests on a completely different base. It's unintentional. It arose independent of human design, like a stalagmitic cavern. Forms which are in themselves quite ugly turn up fortuitously, without design, in such incredible surroundings that they sparkle with a sudden wondrous poetry."
"If we are to change our world view, images have to change. The artist now has a very important job to do. He's not a little peripheral figure entertaining rich people, he's really needed."
"Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out."
"Any acceleration constitutes progress, Miss Glory. Nature had no understanding of the modern rate of work. From a technical standpoint the whole of childhood is pure nonsense. Simply wasted time. An untenable waste of time."
"The elimination of the fear of death transforms the individual's way of being in the world."
"No one cares about the artist Kafka, who troubles us with his puzzling aesthetic, because we'd rather have Kafka as the fusion of experience and work, the Kafka who had a difficult relationship with his father and didn't know how to deal with women."
"What has passed is already finished with. What I find more interesting is what is still to come."
"And think about the precise meaning of that term: a Narcissus is not proud. A proud man has disdain for other people, he undervalues them. The Narcissus overvalues them, because in every person's eyes he sees his own image, and wants to embellish it. So he takes nice care of all his mirrors."
"What does it mean to live in truth? Putting it negatively is easy enough: it means not lying, not hiding, and not dissimulating."
"Oh lovers! be careful in those dangerous first days! once you've brought breakfast in bed you'll have to bring it forever, unless you want to be accused of lovelessness and betrayal."
"A style is not a matter of camera angles or fancy footwork, it's an expression, an accurate expression of your particular opinion."
"Whether or not we believe in survival of consciousness after death, reincarnation, and karma, it has very serious implications for our behavior."
"I continued studying by myself in the field of jazz with my own technique of improvisation, walking bass lines, rhythms, all kinds of stuff, which I created for myself."
"I was fortunate enough to visit a lot of beautiful places around the world. The most astonishing and memorable experiences were my trips to Africa and Australia."
"It's at the borders of pain and suffering that the men are separated from the boys."
"I think everybody dreamt somehow to make a film in Hollywood, you know."
"If I don't practice the way I should, then I won't play the way that I know I can."
"The exercise of power is determined by thousands of interactions between the world of the powerful and that of the powerless, all the more so because these worlds are never divided by a sharp line: everyone has a small part of himself in both."
"But isn't it true that an author can write only about himself?"
"Music is another great pleasure of life. I like all sorts."
"Isn't it the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopelessness is the very soil that nourishes human hope; perhaps one could never find sense in life without first experiencing its absurdity."
"I don't think it's a low point being in the finals of the French Open, three points away from the victory."
"Hate traps us by binding us too tightly to our adversary."
"Because beauty isn't enough, there must be something more."
"People are always shouting they want to create a better future. It's not true. The future is an apathetic void of no interest to anyone. The past is full of life, eager to irritate us, provoke and insult us, tempt us to destroy or repaint it. The only reason people want to be masters of the future is to change the past."
"Beyond this day, no thinking person could fail to see what would happen."
"So the whole basis for jazz music is based on the fact that the bass player could not play his instrument."
"It is up to us to make the right choice and the right decisions."
"There's a great danger in making this seem more important than it is, this whole Free Cinema thing."
"I love photo sessions. I'm alone, I'm the queen, everyone's taking care of me."
"My boyfriend thinks I lost my true calling to be a librarian."
"Miles Davis had me play and he hired me the following week and after that, everything broke wide open."
"The events in the square, of course, made a deep impression on me and many other parents."
"Great God of the Ants, thou hast granted victory to thy servants. I appoint thee honorary Colonel."
"The novel is born not of the theoretical spirit but of the spirit of humor."
"I'm now beginning to feel that the pessimistic vision is not for the movies."
"A girl who is interested in becoming a model must first accept the fact that she is the product. She must be ready to deal with a lot of rejection."
"We will also allow state companies to sell shares to their workers and will pass a law allowing citizens to start companies of their own with no limits on the number of employees or on the firm's output."
"I didn't have the same fitness or ability as the other girls, so I had to beat them with my mind."
"Well, listen, you know, the Czech saying is, you know, when you are drowning you are grabbing even a little twig. That's what all Czechs were doing, grabbing for... with the hope for this little twig."
"A novel that does not uncover a hitherto unknown segment of existence is immoral. Knowledge is the novel's only morality."
"Loves are like empires: when the idea they are founded on crumbles, they too, fade away."
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