When we look at a photograph of ourselves or of others, we are really looking at the return of the dead. Roland Barthes More Quotes by Roland Barthes More Quotes From Roland Barthes Why is it better to last than to burn? Roland Barthes lasts Other countries drink to get drunk, and this is accepted by everyone; in France, drunkenness is a consequence, never an intention. A drink is felt as the spinning out of a pleasure, not as the necessary cause of an effect which is sought: wine is not only a philtre, it is also the leisurely act of drinking. Roland Barthes wine drinking country Pleasure is continually disappointed, reduced, deflated, in favor of strong, noble values: Truth, Death, Progress, Struggle, Joy, etc. Its victorious rival is Desire: we are always being told about Desire, never about Pleasure. Roland Barthes strong struggle joy The gesture of the amorous embrace seems to fulfill, for a time, the subject's dream of total union with the loved being: The longing for consummation with the other. Roland Barthes gestures unions dream Henceforth I would have to cosent to combine two voices: the voice of banality (to say what everyone sees and knows) and the voice of singularity (to replenish such banality with all the élan of an emotion which belonged only to myself). Roland Barthes voice emotion two Tout refus du langage est une mort. Any refusal of language is a death. Roland Barthes refusal language Death of the Father would deprive literature of many of its pleasures. If there is no longer a Father, why tell stories? Doesn't every narrative lead back to Oedipus? Isn't storytelling always a way of searching for one's origin, speaking one's conflicts with the Law, entering into the dialectic of tenderness and hatred? Roland Barthes oedipus law father I love you is unsubtle. It removes explanations, facilities, degrees, scruples. Roland Barthes scruples degrees love-you The Photograph is violent: not because it shows violent tings, but because on each occasion (i)it fills the sight by force(i), and because in it nothing can be refused or transformed (that we can sometimes call it mild does not contradict its violence: many say that sugar is mild, but to me sugar is violent, and I call it so). Roland Barthes sugar sight doe The Ventoux is a god of Evil, to which sacrifices must be made. It never forgives weakness and extracts an unfair tribute of suffering. Roland Barthes forgiving sacrifice evil Literature is without proofs. By which it must be understood that it cannot prove, not only what it says, but even that it is worth the trouble of saying it. Roland Barthes understanding trouble literature Literature is that which he can not read without pain, without choking on truth. Roland Barthes choke pain literature The text you write must prove to me that it desires me. This proof exists: it is writing. Writing is: the science of the various blisses of language, its Kama Sutra (this science has but one treatise: writing itself). Roland Barthes language desire writing The discourse on the Text should itself be nothing other than text, research, textual activity, since the Text is that social space which leaves no language safe, outside, nor any subject of the enunciation in position as judge, master, analyst, confessor, decoder. The theory of the Text can coincide only with a practice of writing. Roland Barthes space practice writing The necessary condition for an image is sight. Roland Barthes conditions sight All of a sudden it didn't bother me not being modern. Roland Barthes modern bother Literature is like phosphorus: it shines with its maximum brilliance and the moment when it attempts to die. Roland Barthes moments shining literature The skyscraper establishes the block, the block creates the street, the street offers itself to man. Roland Barthes skyscraper block men All those young photographers who are at work in the world, determined upon the capture of actuality, do not know that they are agents of Death. Roland Barthes agents determined world Those who fail to reread are obliged to read the same story everywhere. Roland Barthes obliged failing stories
