Paul Auster Quotes

And the heart that is soonest awake to the flowers is always the first to be touch'd by the thorns.

I like showing the gritty truthful dark side of humanity.

I met in the street a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat worn, his cloak was out at the elbows, the water passed through his shoes, - and the stars through his soul.

Remember, beneath every cynic there lies a romantic, and probably an injured one.

To my detriment I'm quite rosy-visioned about the idea of love. It's slightly embarrassing but it's part of who I am.

I always play what I call The Girl. The nice straight character. Sincere. Usually the victim. I'm put upon. I suffer.

It's not a small world! It's a painful, ugly world!

There is cruelty in the world Eliza, you can see that, can't you? It surrounds us. It breathes on us. We spend our life trying to escape it.

It's important to not be naive about this world and know that it's not necessarily a good place to be.

After all, a homeless man has reason to cry, everything in the world is pointed against him.

Children understand intuitively that the world they have been born into is not a blessed world.

We come into the world whole, all of us, but we don't know that, don't know that life will be taking large chunks out of us, forever.

Nothing was easier to shatter than the fragile shield of an idealist.

God save us from idealists! They dream of a world without injustice, and what crime won't they commit to get it! I swear, Mirella, I'll settle for a world with good manners.

It's a cruel world, don't you think?

All the great things that I get to be curious about, see, and experience because I'm sensitive to the world, it also opens up these areas where there's a lot of pain and suffering. You're just aware, aware, aware.

There are men that are birds, and their raiment is trembling feathers, for they show their souls to everyone and everything that is ungentle or untutored or evil or mockery is as a rude stone cast at them, and they suffer all day long, or as Paul remarks they are slain every moment.

I can offer you only: this world like a knife

I just found this world a hard place to be good in,’ says Bunny, then he closes his eyes and, with an expiration of breath, goes still.

The weight of the sky dropped onto Atlas's back, almost smashing him flat until he managed to get to his knees, struggling to get out from under the crushing weight of the sky. But it was too late. "Noooooo!" He bellowed so hard it shook the mountain. "Not again!" Atlas was trapped under his old burden.

There was no justice, there was only life. And life she had.

You know...my flower...I'm responsible for her. And she's so weak! And so naive. She has four ridiculous thorns to defend her against the world.

The more we struggle for life as pleasure, the more we are actually killing what we love.

AFFLICTION, n. An acclimatizing process preparing the soul for another and bitter world.

The evil done by oneself, self-begotten, self-bred, crushes the foolish, as a diamond breaks a precious stone.