“Solitude desolates me; company oppresses me.”

“This perpetual hurry of business and company ruins me in soul if not in body. More solitude and earlier hours!”

William Wilberforce (1759–1833) English politician

“I hate who steals my solitude, without really offer me in exchange company.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

“My solitude doesn’t depend on the presence or absence of people; on the contrary, I hate who steals my solitude without, in exchange, offering me true company.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

“True happiness is impossible without solitude…. I need solitude in my life as I need food and drink and the laughter of little children. Extravagant though it may sound, solitude is the filter of my soul. It nourishes me, and rejuvenates me. Left alone, I discovered that I keep myself good company.”

Sophia Loren (1934) Italian actress

“Solitude is good, desolation is bad. I have experienced both.”

Luis Miguel (1970) Puerto Rican singer; music producer

“Nine hundred feet below my cave rhododendrons blossomed. I climbed barren mountain-tops. Long tramps led me to desolate valleys studded with translucent lakes... Solitude, solitude! ...Mind and senses develop their sensibility in this contemplative life made up of continual observations and reflections. Does one become a visionary or, rather, is it not that one has been blind until then?”

Alexandra David-Néel (1868–1969) French explorer, spiritualist, Buddhist, anarchist and writer

“A confession : solitude no longer hurt me.”

Mario Benedetti (1920–2009) Uruguayan journalist, novelist, and poet

“Letter writing is the only device combining solitude with good company.”

George Gordon Byron (1788–1824) English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement

“Give me solitude — give me Nature — give me again, O Nature, your primal sanities!”

Walt Whitman book Fulles d'herba