“A novel is a mirror walking down a road”
Source: The English Patient
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Michael Ondaatje44
Canadian writer 1943Related quotes
Stendhal book The Red and the Black
Un roman est un miroir qui se promène sur une grande route. Tantôt il reflète à vos yeux l’azur des cieux, tantôt la fange des bourbiers de la route. Et l’homme qui porte le miroir dans sa hotte sera par vous accusé‚ d’être immoral ! Son miroir montre la fange, et vous accusez le miroir! Accusez bien plutôt le grand chemin où est le bourbier, et plus encore l’inspecteur des routes qui laisse l’eau croupir et le bourbier se former.
Vol. II, ch. XIX
Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black) (1830)
“How many roads must a man walk down?”
Douglas Adams The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy pentalogy
Source: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Stephen Vincent Benét (1898–1943) poet, short story writer, novelist
Source: Young Adventure (1918), The Quality of Courage
Lin Yutang (1895–1976) Chinese writer
"The Epigrams of Lusin"
Variant: Hope is like a road in the country; there was never a road, but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence.
“(Windows work two ways, mirrors one way.)
You never walk through mirrors or swim through windows.”
Jim Morrison (1943–1971) lead singer of The Doors
The Lords and the New Creatures: Poems (1969), The Lords: Notes on Vision
“The road up and the road down is one and the same.”
Heraclitus (-535) pre-Socratic Greek philosopher
Fragment 60
Variant translations:
The road up and the road down are one and the same.
The road uphill and the road downhill are one and the same.
The way up and the way down are one and the same.
Numbered fragments