You see how wrong I go, how ridiculous I'm making myself in your eyes by keeping on guessing wrong like this! Doesn't that help you to come out with it? Come on now! Robert Musil More Quotes by Robert Musil More Quotes From Robert Musil We have gained reality and lost dream. No more lounging under a tree and peering at the sky between one's big and second toes; there's work to be done. To be efficient, one cannot be hungry and dreamy but must eat steak and keep moving. Robert Musil dream reality moving The secret of a good librarian is that he never reads anything more of the literature in his charge than the title and the table of contents. Anyone who lets himself go and starts reading a book is lost as a librarian...He's bound to lose perspective. Robert Musil perspective reading book What is perceptible to one’s mistrust is the cut-and-dried way that life is divided up and the ready-made form it assumes, the ever-recurring sameness of it, the pre-formations passed down by generation after generation, the ready-made language not only of the tongue but also of the sensations and the feelings. Robert Musil generations cutting feelings All still lifes are actually paintings of the world on the sixth day of creation, when God and the world were alone together, without man! Robert Musil together men world Every word wants to be taken literally, else it decays into a lie. But one mustn't take any word literally, else the world becomes a madhouse. Robert Musil decay taken lying Is not art a tool we employ to peel the kitsch off life? Layer by layer art strips life bare. The more abstract it gets, the more transparent the air is. Can it be that the farther it is removed from life, the clearer art becomes? Robert Musil tools air art ... nothing is more human than substituting the quantity of words and actions for their character. But using imprecise words is very similar to using lots of words, for the more imprecise a word is, the greater the area it covers. Robert Musil stupidity talking character Anyone who still wants to experience fairytales these days can’t afford to dither when it comes to using their brains. Robert Musil fairytale want brain Wordsworth's particular grace, his charisma, as theologians say, has been granted in equal measure to so very few men since time was--to Plato and who else? Robert Musil what-matters plato men ... the genius never makes anything new, but always something that is just different, and the average talents provide him the possibility within which his genius condenses into achievements. Robert Musil achievement different average There is nothing in this world as invisible as a monument Robert Musil invisible this-world world An impractical man--which he not only seems to be, but really is--will always be unreliable and unpredictable in his dealings with others. He will engage in actions that mean something else to him than to others, but he is at peace with himself about everything as long as he can make it all come together in a fine idea. Robert Musil men mean ideas It is life that does the thinking all around us, forming with playful ease the connections our reason can only laboriously patch together piecemeal, and never to such kaleidoscopic effect. Robert Musil connections together thinking Strong emotional experiences are for the most part impersonal. Anyone who has hated another person so much that only chance stands between that person and death knows this, as does whoever has fallen into the catastrophe of a deep depression, anyone who has loved a woman to the dregs, anyone who has beaten others bloody or ever come up behind another person with muscles trembling. "Losing one's head," language calls it. Emotional experience is, in itself, poor in qualities; qualities are brought to it by the person who has the experience. Robert Musil emotional strong depression For only fools, fanatics, and mental cases can stand living at the highest pitch of soul; a sane person must be content with declaring that life would not be worth living without a spark of that mysterious fire. Robert Musil sparks soul fire Every day there comes a moment when a person lays his hands in his lap and all his busyness collapses like ashes. The work accomplished is, from the soul's point of view, entirely imaginary. Robert Musil soul views hands What is the use of good painting? We want a spell cast upon the optical part of our existence! We seldom really see the world, but when we do, we become as still as a picture. Robert Musil use want world ... the structure of a page of good prose is, analyzed logically, not something frozen but the vibrating of a bridge, which changes with every step one takes on it. Robert Musil frozen pages bridges ... the novel is called upon like no other art form to incorporate the intellectual content of an age. Robert Musil intellectual age art The proverbial notion of historical distance consists in our having lost ninety-five of every hundred original facts, so the remaining ones can be arranged however one likes. Robert Musil distance likes historical
