Emile Zola Quotes
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From the moment I start a new novel, life's just one endless torture. The first few chapters may go fairly well and I may feel there's still a chance to prove my worth, but that feeling soon disappears and every day I feel less and less satisfied.
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The past was but the cemetery of our illusions: one simply stubbed one's toes on the gravestones.
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The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.
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Over all crowds there seems to float a vague distress, an atmosphere of pervasive melancholy, as if any large gathering of people creates an aura of terror and pity.
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Why is it that my heart is so touched whenever I meet a dog lost in our noisy streets? Why do I feel such anguished pity when I see one of these creatures coming and going, sniffing everyone, frightened, despairing of even finding its master?
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If I cannot overwhelm with my quality, I will overwhelm with my quantity.
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The road to Lourdes is littered with crutches, but not one wooden leg.
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It is not necessary that one should humble oneself to deserve assistance, it is sufficient that one should suffer.
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I do not despair in the least of ultimate triumph. I repeat it with intense conviction.
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If people can just love each other a little bit, they can be so happy.
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I would rather die of passion than of boredom.
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Violence has never prospered, you can't remake the world in a day. Anyone who promises to change everything for you all at once is either a fool or a rogue!
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Art is a corner of creation seen through a temperament.
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Perfection is such a nuisance that I often regret having cured myself of using tobacco.
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Inability, human incapacity, is the only boundary to an art.
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In my view you cannot claim to have seen something until you have photographed it.
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The fear of life, the fear of burdens and of duties, of annoyances and of catastrophes! The fear of life, which makes us, through dread of its sufferings, refuse its joys. Ah! I tell you, this cowardliness enrages me; I cannot forgive it. We must live - live a complete life - live all our life.
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People like comfort; that's natural. But as for making money simply for the sake of making it, and giving yourself far more trouble and anxiety to gain it than you can ever get pleasure from it when it's gained, why, as for me, I'd rather sit still and cross my arms.
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Classical education has deformed everything, and has imposed upon us as geniuses men of correct, facile talent, who follow the beaten track.
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She was cold by nature, self-love predominating over passion; rather than being virtuous, she preferred to have her pleasures all to herself.
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The vague torment of ... ambition.
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It all seemed a hollow sham now - that strict code, that conscientious virtue that condemned her to the sterile joys of pious women! No, no, she'd had enough of that; she wanted to live!
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Governments are suspicious of literature because it is a force that eludes them.
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And that wreched creature without hands or feet, who had to be put to bed and fed like a child, that pitiable remnant of a man, whose almost vanished life was nothing more than one scream of pain, cried out in furious indignation: 'What a fool one must be to go and kill oneself!' " - 'Joy of Life