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There is only one pleasure-that of being alive. All the rest is misery.

Cesare Pavese

You will hear words old and spent and useless like costumes left over from yesterday’s parties.
CESARE PAVESE

Costume Old Party Word Yourself
A consoling thought: what matters is not what we do, but the spirit in which we do it. Others suffer too; so much so that there is nothing in the world but suffering; the problem is simply to keep a clear conscience.
CESARE PAVESE

Clear Conscience Spirit Suffering Thinking World
The only reason why we are always thinking of our own ego is that we have to live with it more continuously than with anyone else’s.
CESARE PAVESE

Continue Ego Live Reason Thinking
There is no finer revenge than that which others inflict on your enemy. Moreover, it has the advantage of leaving you the role of a generous man.
CESARE PAVESE

Enemy Generosity Man Revenge Yourself
Remember, writing poetry is like making love: one will never know whether one’s own pleasure is shared.
CESARE PAVESE

Happiness Love Poetry Remember Share Writing
The problems that agitate one generation are exstinguished for the next, not because they have been solved but because the general lack of interest sweeps them away.
CESARE PAVESE

Generation Interest Problem Solve
What world lies beyond that stormy sea I do not know, but every ocean has a distant shore, and I shall reach it.
CESARE PAVESE

Beyond Lying Ocean Reach World
A man succeeds in completing a work only when his qualities transcend that work.
CESARE PAVESE

Complete Man Success Transcendence Work
The world, the future, is now within you as your past, as experience, skill in technique, and the rich, everlasting mystery is found to be childish you that, at the time, you made no effort to possess.
CESARE PAVESE

Effort Experience Future Past Skills Technique World Yourself
We must never say, even in fun, that we are disheartened, because someone might take us at our word.
CESARE PAVESE

Feeling Heart Ourselves Word
Artists are the monks of the bourgeois state.
CESARE PAVESE

Artist Monk State
The real affliction of old age is remorse.
CESARE PAVESE

Affliction Age Old Reality
One stops being a child when one realizes that telling one’s trouble does not make it any better.
CESARE PAVESE

Better Children Oneself Stop Trouble
Give me the ready hand rather than the ready tongue.
CESARE PAVESE

Hands Mouth Ready Willing
The act the act must not be a revenge. It must be a calm, weary renunciation, a closing of accounts, a private, rhythmic deed. The last remark.
CESARE PAVESE

Account Act Private Remark Revenge Yourself
Waiting is still an occupation. It is having nothing to wait for that is terrible.
CESARE PAVESE

Occupation Patient Terrible

There is only one pleasure-that of being alive. All the rest is misery.

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There is only one pleasure-that of being alive. All the rest is misery.

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