I'm looking at a dead event and trying to give it new life. In a sense, I'm a taxidermist. Yann Martel More Quotes by Yann Martel More Quotes From Yann Martel How long does it take for a broken spirit to kill a body that has food, water and shelter? Yann Martel broken-spiritwaterlong Quickly you make rash decisions. You dismiss your last allies: hope and trust. There, you've defeated yourself. Fear, which is but an impression, has triumphed over you. Yann Martel alliesover-youdecision Oncoming death is terrible enough, but worse still is oncoming death with time to spare, time in which all the happiness that was yours and all the happiness that might have been yours becomes clear to you. You see with utter lucidity all that you are losing. Yann Martel losingenoughmight I am a person who believes in form, in the harmony of order. Where we can, we must give things a meaningful shape. Yann Martel meaningfulorderbelieve [The taxidermist is] a historian, dealing with an animal's past; the zookeeper is a politician, dealing with an animal's present; and everyone else is a citizen who must decide on that animal's future (...) The indifference of the many, combined with the active hatred of the few, has sealed the fate of animals. Yann Martel fateanimalpast The language of prose is very different than the language of cinema, so the movie has to successfully translate what was in the book. Yann Martel cinemadifferentbook There's no peace like the peace of an inner courtyard on a sunny day. Yann Martel sunnysunny-daypeace I wish I could convey the perfection of a seal slipping into water or a spider monkey swinging from point to point or a lion merely turning its head. But language founders in such seas. Better to picture it in your head if you want to feel it. Yann Martel perfectionseawater My next book - each one while I'm working on it - dances in my mind and thrills me at every turn. If it didn't, why would I write it? Yann Martel mindwritingbook I'm not a consumer. I hate buying clothes. I don't have a mobile. I just don't need things. I don't like things. Yann Martel clotheshateneeds If you write genre fiction, you follow the rules, and you have to follow them because readers expect that. Yann Martel genrewritingfiction Music moves me - duh - and that is like having a window opening on a heightened reality, but the effect is fleeting: When the music ends, the magic, the uplifting, vanishes and the window slams shut. Words, on the other hand, by the nature of how they work, emotions evoked by dint of carefully laid out thoughts, have a more lingering effect. Yann Martel upliftingrealitymoving Everything was screaming: the sea, the wind, my heart. Yann Martel seaheartwind Despair was a heavy blackness that let no light in or out. It was a hell beyond expression. I thank God it always passed. Yann Martel despairlightexpression Books are something social - a writer speaking to a reader - so I think making the reading of a book the center of a social event, the meeting of a book club, is a brilliant idea. Yann Martel readingbookthinking My greatest wish - other than salvation - was to have a book. Yann Martel salvationwishbook There are animals we haven't stopped by. Don't think they're harmless. Life will defend itself no matter how small it is. Yann Martel matteranimalthinking I love Canada. Its a wonderful political act of faith that exists atop a breathtakingly beautiful land. Yann Martel politicallandbeautiful Words are much better at relating emotions and thoughts. Yann Martel emotion If you stumble at mere believability, what are you living for? Isn't love hard to believe? Yann Martel life-of-pi-bookbeliefbelieve
