“Fatal human malice is the staple of narrators, original sin the mother-fluid of historians. But it is a risky enterprise to have to write of virtue.”

“The concept of original sin gives us a penetrating insight into human destiny.”

Leszek Kolakowski (1927–2009) Philosopher, historian of ideas

“Then the writing became so fluid that I sometimes felt as if I were writing for the sheer pleasure of telling a story, which may be the human condition that most resembles levitation.”

Gabriel García Márquez (1927–2014) Colombian writer

“When virtue is pictured as innocence and innocence equated with childlikeness, the implication is obviously that knowledge and experience are no longer media of goodness, but have become in themselves contaminating. This is a very despairing outlook, in its way as black as Augustine's original sin, for it supposes that original goodness will in all likelihood be defiled…It surrenders the attempt to represent virtue in a mature phase.”

Marina Warner (1946) writer and mythographer

“In the past we believed both sexes were born with original sin. Today, we have come to unconsciously believe in the original sin of boys, but the original innocence of girls.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

“(…) Sin and virtue refer to a person only. Without a sinful or virtuous person what is sin or virtue? At the level of the absolute there are no persons; the ocean of pure awareness is neither virtuous nor sinful. Sin and virtue are invariably relative.”

Nisargadatta Maharaj (1897–1981) Indian guru

“Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If cavemen had known how to laugh, history would have been different.”

Chuck Klosterman (1972) Author, Columnist

“Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the cave-man had known how to laugh, History would have been different.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

“Father, bless me for I have sinned, I did an original sin… I poked a badger with a spoon.”

Eddie Izzard (1962) British stand-up comedian, actor and writer

“The baby understands that its mother loves it. […] Words have their origin in baby talk, so words have their origin in love.”

Yasunari Kawabata (1899–1972) Japanese author, Nobel Prize winner