Italo Calvino Quotes

The only joy in the world is to begin. It is good to be alive because living is beginning, always, every moment.

Man is immortal; therefore he must die endlessly. For life is a creative idea; it can only find itself in changing forms

I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one

The world of art is not a world of immortality but of metamorphosis.

Each change of many-colour'd life he drew, Exhausted worlds, and then imagin'd new.

We forget that the world is what we imagine it to be. We stop being the sun and become, instead, the pool of water reflecting it.

Either the world is so tiny or we are enormous; in either case, we fill it completely.

I think the world is changing and all that matters is that I'm creating things.

Truly every generation discovers the world all new again and knows it can improve it.

I'm always trying to change things - change my character, change my look, change my hair, change my facial hair, change my costumes, or implement different jackets or catchphrases. I try to keep myself fresh.

The mirror is the tool of the one who wants to do a self-portrait. And if you want to make a photo you need a mirror.

To express yourself in freedom, you must die to everything of yesterday. From the 'old', you derive security; from the 'new', you gain the flow.

I haven't been alone in years. It's that alone time when you really look yourself in the mirror and you see what you really want. It just gets a little convoluted in this industry. That said, I really want to act. But, now I think it's time for me to do something else for a while, so that I can feel that passion again.

Without death there would be very little progress.

In the history of the world many souls have been, are, and will be, and with a little reflection this is marvelous and not depressing. Many jerks are made gloomy about it, for they think quantity buries them alive. That's just crazy. Numbers are very dangerous, but the main thing about them is that they humble your pride. And that's good.

Change the world. Build a business. Have fun.

He wanted paper and something to write with, some way to sustain a thought, to place it in the world.

Sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a dent in the world, and that's what I started out to do - to make a dent in pop culture.

The world by and large has to be reinvented.

Ever-newer waters flow on those who step into the same rivers.

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth! And, by the incantation of this verse, Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind! Be through my lips to unawakened earth The trumpet of a prophecy! O, wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

We have no physical model of this endless rhythm of individuation and involvement, we do have its image in the world of art, most purely in dance.

The summer ends and we wonder who we are And there you go, my friends, with your boxes in your car And today I passed the high school, the river, the maple tree I passed the farms that made it Through the last days of the century And I knew that I was going to learn again Again, in this less hazy light I saw the fields beyond the fields The fields beyond the field

There is no such thing as a natural death: nothing that happens to a man is ever natural, since his presence calls the world into question. All men must die: but for every man his death is an accident and, even if he knows it and consents to it, an unjustifiable violation.