That is what poetry can do. It speaks to us of what does not exist, which is not only better than what exists, but even more like the truth.
IVAN TURGENEVHowever much you knock at nature’s door, she will never answer you in comprehensible words.
More Ivan Turgenev Quotes
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I was afraid of looking into my heart…afraid of thinking seriously about anything…I did not want to know whether I was loved, and I did not want to admit to myself that I was not loved.
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In my case there was no first love. I began with the second.
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Youth eats all the sugared fancy cakes and regards them as its daily bread. But there’ll come a time when you’ll start asking just for a crust.
IVAN TURGENEV -
I never started from ideas but always from character.
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I walked in the meadows of green grieving for my life.
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People without firmness of character love to make up a fate for themselves; that relieves them of the necessity of having their own will and of taking responsibility for themselves.
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Behind me there are already so many memories Lots of memories, but no point in remembering them, and ahead of me a long, long road with nothing to aim for I just don’t want to go along it.
IVAN TURGENEV -
No matter how often you knock at nature’s door, she won’t answer in words you can understand–for Nature is dumb. She’ll vibrate and moan like a violin, but you mustn’t expect a song.
IVAN TURGENEV -
Don’t force me into saying what I don’t want to say, and what I won’t say.
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Each individual is more or less dimly aware of his significance, is aware that he’s something innately superior, something eternal–and lives, is obligated to live, in the moment and for the moment.
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If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything is ready, we shall never begin.
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I only know that I feel tired, antiquated; I feel as though I had been living a long, long time.
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It’s all romanticism, nonsense, rottenness, art.
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Whatever a person may pray for, that person prays for a miracle. Every prayer comes down to this – Almighty God, grant that two times two not equal four.
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Ah, but in time the heat of noontide passes, and to it there succeed nightfall and dusk, with a return to the quiet fold where for the weary an the heavy-laden there waits sleep, sweet sleep.
IVAN TURGENEV