László Krasznahorkai Quotes

[...] for it was the approaching dawn that held him in its spell, that 'promise kept each morning' that the earth, along with the town and his own person, would emerge from beneath the shadow of the night, and that the delicate glimmer of dawn would yield to the bright light of day...

What is behind me still remains ahead of me.

It’s not that I don’t understand why a person has to die, but rather, I don’t understand why a person has to live, Baron Béla Wenckheim pondered

"Puesto que se enteraría por su propia experiencia de que el jardín era el perfeccionamiento supremo de la idea del jardín, ya que la mejor forma de definirlo era afirmar que su creador había "alcanzado la simplicidad", al tratarse de un jardín, escribía el autor con notable apasionamiento, que expresaba lo infinitamente simple mediante fuerzas infinitamente complejas."

at this point, we must refocus our attention on this, as fear is what defines human existence,
...you will see that fear is the deepest element that can be grasped in this organic and inorganic world, and there’s nothing else other than fear, because nothing else bears within it such dreadful strength

(...) he was lost in successive waves of time, coolly aware of the minimal speck of his own being, seeing himself as the defenseless, helpless victim of the earth’s crust, the brittle arc of his life between birth and death caught up in the dumb struggle between surging seas and rising hills, and it was as if he could already feel the gentle tremor beneath the chair supporting his bloated body, a tremor that might be the harbinger of seas about to break in on him, a pointless warning to flee before its all-encompassing power made escape impossible, and he could see himself running, part of a desperate, terrified stampede comprising stags, bears, rabbits, deer, rats, insects and reptiles, dogs and men, just so many futile, meaningless lives in the common, incomprehensible devastation, while above them flapped clouds of birds, dropping in exhaustion, offering the only possible hope.

In vain would we talk about nature, nature doesn’t want this; it is no use to talk about the divine, the divine doesn’t want this, and anyway, no matter how much we want to, we are unable to talk about anything other than ourselves, because we are only capable of talking about history, about the human condition, about that never-changing quality whose essence carries such titillating relevance only for us; otherwise, from the viewpoint of that “divine otherwise,” this essence of ours is, actually, possibly of no consequence whatsoever, for ever and aye.

Se gandi iar la cotet si la porci, intrucat simti ca la fel cum cei care nu banuiesc ca din providenta ce pluteste deasupra zilelor noastre o sa ramana doar lumina de pe cutitul cu care se injunghie porcul, tot asa nici noi nu banuim nimic, si nici n-o sa aflam vreodata ceva despre acest infricosator adio.

"egyszerűen csak arról van szó, magyarázta később a hét gyereknek, hogy egy napon ,"eltört nála a mécses", mert most ha visszagondol, az ő története valójában nem is azzal a bizonyos folyóparttal indult, hanem jóval korábban, jóval a folyóparti események előtt, amikor egyszer elfogta egy addig ismeretlen, egy addig teljességgel ismeretlen mélységű és az ő egész lényét alapjaiban megrázó elkeseredés, hirtelen, egyik napról a másikra egyszer csak azon vette észre magát, hogy nagyon, hogy halálosan el van keseredve, amiként akkoriban fogalmazott, "a világ állapota" miatt, és ez nem valami gyorsan érkező és gyorsan múló hangulat következtében állt nála elő, hanem hát, ez egy olyan iszonyú éles bevillanás volt, mondta, ami örökre beég, tudniillik bevillant neki, hogy a világban, ha volt is, már nincsen semmiféle nemes, nem akarja eltúlozni, de tényleg, komolyan, hogy őkörülötte talán nem is volt, mindenesetre soha többé nem is lesz se szép, se jó"

Sheltered spots tend to increase your fear, the fear of the unknown perils of outside,
a fear that simply regenerates and reinforces itself until it becomes overwhelming,
making you incapable of drawing conclusions about what's really taking place outside.

We have reached the end of one era, and now we don't know what is all around us. Because we're already in a new era, and it is very different from the old one. Science and the world of technology are both changing everything so quickly, even our bodies. So the original ancient culture was present here, but to no avail, at this point in history it has come to stop. It still has some effect, some kind of continuity, but it cannot analyse and reformulate things, it cannot impact things with absolute strength. The age to follow will be full of dangers. It will be full of difficulties. In all likelihood, it will not be a good future for mankind. It is even possible this new era will mean the end of mankind.

"هكذا قال فى نفسه مقرًا بأنه لا يسطيع الاطمئنان إلى قرار مرضٍ فى شأن التحسّن الذى لا يزال مستمرًا فى حالته التى هى حالة مؤسفة عامة. وكأنما أراد التشديد على الفكرة بأن ركّز انتباهه، المشتت ظاهرًا، على ما كانت كلمات فالوسكا الرنانة تصفه بأنه "ذلك الإعلان الأبدى عن البشائر الطيبة"، وعلى قبة السماء غير المبالية بأى شئ، عندما أدرك فجأة، مثلما حدث مع الأستاذ ذى الذهن الشارد الذى صار مضرب الأمثال عندما اكتشف نظارته المفقودة فوق أنفه... أدرك أن ليس عليه أن ينظر إلى الأعلى، بل إلى الأسفل، عند قدميه لأن ما يبحث عنه موجود هناك... موجود هناك إلى حد أنه كان واقفًا عليه، وكان يطأ سطحه طيلة الوقت، وكان مقدّرًا له أن يواصل السير عليه فى مستفبل وشيك. ومع ملاحظته هذا الأمر، أرجع إدراكه المتأخر له إلى حقيقة أنه أمر ظاهر كثيرًا، قريبًا كثيرًا، فكانت المشكلة كامنة فى قربه غير المتوقع. كان قادرًا على لمسه بيده، وعلى السير عليه؛ وهذا ما جعله غير منتبه إليه."

There is a war going on out there, and it's only worth waking to the dying night if you are prepared to be utterly ruthless'; a war - he kept scanning the rooftops - where everything is engaged in a conflict that has no rules; a war in which one side must continually besiege the other, in which to aim at anything but victory was pointless. It was a struggle in which the only power to remain standing was that which looked for no reasons, which was content to accept that the whole thing should remain without an explanation, because - and here he remembered The Prince's advice - it simply didn't exist...

Death, he felt, was only a kind of warning rather than a desperate and permanent end.

"Caddedeki eve geldiğinde daha fazla dayanamayacağına ve dinlenmesi gerektiğine karar vererek odasına kapanmıştı. Dinlenecek ve tek saniyeyi bile boşa harcamamak için bir daha asla kalkmayacaktı: O anda, yatağına uzandığı saniyede, artık "salaklaşmanın, aptallaşmanın, odunlaşmanın, dangalaklaşmanın, terbiyesizliğin, zevksizliğin, kabalığın, cehaletin, bilgisizliğin, ve genel seviyesizliğin tonlarca anısının yorgunluğu"nu atmak için, önünde daha bir elli yıl olsa dinlenmesinin yeterli olmayacağını düşünmüştü."