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Take what you can yourself, and don’t let others get you into their hands; to belong to oneself, that is the whole thing in life.

Ivan Turgenev

I never started from ideas but always from character.
IVAN TURGENEV

Character Ideas Myself Start
Death is like a fisherman, who, having caught a fish in his net, leaves it in the water for a time; the fish continues to swim about, but all the while the net is round it, and the fisherman will snatch it out in his own good time.
IVAN TURGENEV

Death Goodness Leaving Time Water
Great God, grant that twice two be not four.
IVAN TURGENEV

God Greatness Mathematics
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

Heat heavy Pass Return Sleep Time Wait
Time, as is well known, sometimes flies like a bird and sometimes crawls like a worm, but human beings are generally particularly happy when they don’t notice whether it’s passing quickly or slowly.
IVAN TURGENEV

Human Known Notice Pass Quick Time
Love isn’t actually a feeling at all–it’s an illness, a certain condition of body and soul…. Usually it takes possession of someone without his permission, all of a sudden, against his will–just like cholera or a fever.
IVAN TURGENEV

Body Condition Feeling Himself Love Permission Possession Sick Soul Willing
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

Answer Expectation Nature Song Spiritual Understand Word Yourself
Nothing is worse and more hurtful than a happiness that comes too late.
IVAN TURGENEV

Happiness Hurt Late Worst
I’m through with Tolstoy. He has ceased to exist for me…. If I eat a bowl of soup and like it, I know by that fact alone and with absolute certainty that Tolstoy will find it bad, and vice versa.
IVAN TURGENEV

Alone Bad Existence Fact Myself
Nature is not a temple, but a workshop, and man’s the workman in it.
IVAN TURGENEV

Man Nature Temple Workshop
Sternly, remorselessly, fate guides each of us; only at the beginning, when we’re absorbed in details, in all sorts of nonsense, in ourselves, are we unaware of its harsh hand.
IVAN TURGENEV

Beginning Detail Fate Guide Hands Harsh Ourselves
There are some moments in life, some feelings; one can only point to them and pass by.
IVAN TURGENEV

Feeling Life Moments Pass Point
In my case there was no first love. I began with the second.
IVAN TURGENEV

Beginning Love Myself
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.
IVAN TURGENEV

Admit Afraid Heart Love Myself
Nature creates while destroying, and doesn’t care whether it creates or destroys as long as life isn’t extinguished, as long as death doesn’t lose its rights.
IVAN TURGENEV

Creation Destroy Nature Right
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

Eat Regard Time Yourself Youth
I look up to heaven only when I want to sneeze.
IVAN TURGENEV

Heaven Myself
One may speak about anything on earth with fire, with enthusiasm, with ecstasy, but one only speaks about oneself with avidity.
IVAN TURGENEV

Earth Fire Happiness Oneself Talk
Most people can’t understand how others can blow their noses differently than they do.
IVAN TURGENEV

Blow Different People Understand
I was as happy as a fish in water, and I could have stayed in that room for ever, have never left that place.
IVAN TURGENEV

Happiness Myself Place Room Stay Water
I’m incapable of describing the feeling with which I left. I wouldn’t want it ever to be repeated, but I would have considered myself unfortunate if I’d never experienced it.
IVAN TURGENEV

Description Experience Feeling Myself Repeat
A son is like a lopped off branch. As a falcon he comes when he wills and goes where he lists.
IVAN TURGENEV

Branch Himself Son Willing
The fact is that previously they were simply dunces and now they’ve suddenly become nihilists.
IVAN TURGENEV

Atheist Fact Simplicity
All human beings hang by a thread, an abyss may open under their feet at any moment, and yet they have to go and invent all sorts of difficulties for themselves and spoil their lives.
IVAN TURGENEV

Difficult Human Live Moments Open Spoil
Who among us has the strength to oppose petty egoism, those petty good feelings, pity and remorse?
IVAN TURGENEV

Ego Feeling Goodness Strength
What did I hope for, what did I expect, what rich future did I foresee, when the phantom of my first love, rising up for an instant, barely called forth one sigh, one mournful sentiment?
IVAN TURGENEV

Expectation Future Hope Instant Mourn Oneself Rise
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.
IVAN TURGENEV

Equality Miracle Person Prayer

Take what you can yourself, and don’t let others get you into their hands; to belong to oneself, that is the whole thing in life.

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Take what you can yourself, and don’t let others get you into their hands; to belong to oneself, that is the whole thing in life.

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