“Life is not the means for the achievement of an esthetic ideal of perfection; on the contrary, the work is an ethical symbol of life.”

—  Thomas Mann

Reflections of a Non-Political Man [Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen] (1918)
Context: The important thing for me, then, is not the "work," but my life. Life is not the means for the achievement of an esthetic ideal of perfection; on the contrary, the work is an ethical symbol of life.

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Thomas Mann 159
German novelist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate 1875–1955

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