Cesare Pavese: Thing

Cesare Pavese was Italian poet, novelist, literary critic, and translator. Explore interesting quotes on thing.

Cesare Pavese: 274 quotes20 likes

“Things are revealed through the memories we have of them. Remembering a thing means seeing it—only then—for the first time.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“But I have seen the unknown dead, those little men of the Republic. It was they who woke me up. If a stranger, an enemy, becomes a thing like that when he dies, if one stops short and is afraid to walk over him, it means that even beaten our enemy is someone, that after having shed his blood, one must placate it, give this blood a voice, justify the man who shed it. Looking at certain dead is humiliating. One has the impression that the same fate that threw these bodies to the ground holds us nailed to the spot to see them, to fill our eyes with the sight. It's not fear, not our usual cowardice. One feels humiliated because one understands–touching it with one's eyes–that we might be in their place ourselves: there would be no difference, and if we live we owe it to this dirtied corpse. That is why every war is a civil war; every fallen man resembles one who remains and calls him to account.”

Source: The house on the hill (1949), Chapter 23, p. 176

“I realised that Nuto was quite right when he said that to live in a hovel or in a palace was one and the same thing, that blood is the same colour everywhere, and that everybody wants to be rich and in love and make their fortune.”

Source: The moon and the bonfire (1950), Chapter XXIX, p. 167

“We obtain things when we no longer want them.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“Things which cost nothing are those which cost the most. Why? Because they cost us the effort of understanding that they are free.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“The art of living is the art of knowing how to believe lies. The fearful thing about it is that, not knowing what truth may be, we can still recognize lies.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“The man of action is not the headstrong fool who rushes into danger with no thought for himself, but the man who puts into practice the things he knows.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“Writing is a fine thing, because it combines the two pleasures of talking to yourself and talking to a crowd.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“Don't you know that what happens to you once always happens again? You always react in the same way to the same thing. It's no accident when you make a mess. Then you do it again. It's called destiny.”

Source: The devil in the hills (1949), Chapter 11, p. 327

“In fact a man in love or one consumed with hatred creates symbols for himself, as a superstitious man does, from a passion of conferring uniqueness on things or persons. A man who knows nothing of symbols is one of Dante's sluggards. This is why art mirrors itself in primitive rites or strong passions, seeking for symbols, revolving round the primitive taste for savagery, for what is irrational”

blood and sex
This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“The most banal thing, discovered in ourselves, becomes intensely interesting. It is no longer an abstract banality, but an amazing co-ordination between reality and our own individuality.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“The really clever thing, in affairs of this sort, is not to win a woman already desired by everyone, but to discover such a prize while she is still unknown.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“What's got into your head? That I'm returning to my origins? The important things I have in my blood and nobody is going to take them away. I'm here to drink a bottle of my wine and sing a little–with anybody.”

Source: The Beach (1941), Chapter 2, p. 9

“The thing most feared in secret always happens.
I write: oh Thou, have mercy. And then?
All it takes is a little courage.
The more the pain grows clear and definite, the more the instinct for life asserts itself and the thought of suicide recedes.
It seemed easy when I thought of it. Weak women have done it. It takes humility, not pride.
All this is sickening.
Not words. An act. I won't write any more.”

, end. Nine days later he committed suicide, leaving this message: «I forgive everyone and to everyone I ask forgiveness. Well enough? Don't gossip too much».
This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“It is not that things happen to each of us according to his fate, but that he interprets what has happened, if he has power to do so, according to his sense of his own destiny.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“Narrating incredible things as though they were real—old system; narrating realities as though they were incredible—the new.”

This Business of Living (1935-1950)

“She didn't seem dead. There was only a swelling of the lips, as if she were angry. The strange thing was her idea of renting a painter's studio, having an armchiar, no less, drawn up s she could die in front of the window that looked toward Superga. A cat had given her away–it was in the room with her, and the next day, miaowing and scratching the door, it had made them open.”

Ending words
Among women only (1949)