László Krasznahorkai Quotes

... to pour out one's heart and not drink vodka at the same time, well, that is inconceivable for a Russian soul...

Should we die, the mechanics of life would go on without us, and that is what people feel most terribly disturbed by,' Korin interrupted himself, bowed his head, thought for a while, then pulled an agonized expression and started slowly swiveling his head, 'though it is only the very fact that it goes on that enables us properly to understand that there is no mechanism.

as he noticed the feeble ticking of his watch, he suddenly realized that he had been escaping all his life, that life had been a constant escape, escape from meaninglessness into music, from music to guilt, from guilt and self-punishment into pure ratiocination, and finally escape from that too, that it was retreat after retreat, as if his guardian angel had, in his own peculiar fashion, been steering him to the antithesis of retreat, to an almost simple-minded acceptance of things as they were, at which point he understood that there was nothing to be understood, that if there was reason in the world it far transcended his own, and that therefore it was enough to notice and observe that which he actually possessed.

To be more accurate, Eszter continued, it was only a shadow in the mirror, a mirror where the image and the mirror wholly coincided though the shadow nevertheless tried to separate them, to separate two things that had from eternity been the same and could not be separated or cut into two, thereby losing the weightless delight of being swept along with it, substituting, he thought as he stepped away from the drawing-room window, a solid eternity purchased with knowledge for the sweet song of participating in eternity, a song so airy it was lighter than a feather.

...megértette, hogy mindaz, amit mi a létből érzékelünk, nem más, mint a hiábavalóság felfoghatatlan terjedelmű emlékműve, mely az idők végezetéig ismétli önmagát, és hogy nem, korántsem a véletlen szerkeszti a maga rettenetes, kiapadhatatlan, diadalmas, legyőzhetetlen erejével, hogy dolgok szülessenek és szétessenek, hanem mintha egy homályos, démoni szándék dolgozna itt, és ez olyan mértékben bele van szerekesztve a dolgokba és a dolgok közti állapotok szövetébe, hogy a szándék bűze mindent betölt, egy kárhozat tehát, egy megvetés műve a világ, ez csapja meg agyát annak, aki gondolkodni kezd, ezért ő nem is gondolkodik, megtanult nem gondolkodni többé, ami természetesen nem vezetett sehová, mert azt a bűzt csak érzi, bármerre néz, bármerre fordítja a fejét, ez a bűz ott van, mert végül is az ítélet, mely szintén azonos a világgal, azt is tartalmazza, hogy a hiábavalóságnak is és megvetésnek is, mely a szándék formáját öltötte fel, a tudatában kell legyen, a hiábavalóságnak és a megvetésnek is, folyton, minden egyes pillanatban, aki gondolkodni kezd, viszont elég lemondani a gondolkodásról, és csak nézni a dolgokat, már létre is jön a gondolkodás új alakban, vagyis megszabadulni nem lehet, akár gondolkodik az ember, akár nem gondolkodik, mindenképpen a gondolkodás foglya, és iszonyatosan facsarja az orrát a bűz, így hát ő mit tehetne, áltatja magát, azzal áltatja, hogy hagyja, menjenek a dolgok a maguk természetes útján...

ظلت جالسة هناك والدموع تنبع من عينيها وجسدها منهك، صار وزن العالم كله ثقيلًا فوق كتفيها

...the freedom produced by love was the highest condition available in the given order of things, and given that, how strange it was that such love seemed to be characteristic of lonely people who were condemned to live in perpetual isolation, that love was one of the aspects of loneliness most difficult to resolve, and therefore all those millions on millions of individual loves and individual rebellions could never add up to a single love or rebellion, and that because all those millions upon millions of individual experiences testified to the unbearable fact of the world's ideological opposition to this love and rebellion, the world could never transcend its own first great act of rebellion..

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.

You have every cause for anxiety. We are on the threshold of a more searching, more honest, more open society.

every human culture is created by fear,

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.

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.

I would leave everything here: the valleys, the hills, the paths, and the jaybirds from the gardens, I would leave here the petcocks and the padres, heaven and earth, spring and fall, I would leave here the exit routes, the evenings in the kitchen, the last amorous gaze, and all of the city-bound directions that make you shudder, I would leave here the thick twilight falling upon the land, gravity, hope, enchantment, and tranquility, I would leave here those beloved and those close to me, everything that touched me, everything that shocked me, fascinated and uplifted me, I would leave here the noble, the benevolent, the pleasant, and the demonically beautiful, I would leave here the budding sprout, every birth and existence, I would leave here incantation, enigma, distances, inexhaustibility, and the intoxication of eternity; for here I would leave this earth and these stars, because I would take nothing with me from here, because I've looked into what's coming, and I don't need anything from here.” — László Krasznahorkai

Europeans believe that culture is something they can grasp and touch because, for them, culture is comprised of objects, or remnants of objects, and this object, this remnant, conceals within it the essence of the original. For the Chinese, the matter is completely different — -for them, the essence of culture can only be preserved in spiritual form.

It is not always necessary to search for the cause behind everything, because every cause is unfounded. A cause only looks like a cause from a certain viewpoint.