The important thing for me, then, is not the "work," but my life. Life is not the means for the achievement of an esthetic ideal of perfection; on th… - Thomas Mann

His love of the sea had profound roots: the hardworking artist's desire to rest, his longing to get away from the demanding diversity of phenomena and take shelter in the bosom of simplicity and immensity; a forbidden penchant that was entirely antithetical to his mission and, for that very reason, seductive-a proclivity for the unorganized, the immeasurable, the eternal: for nothingness.

The dilemma, my dear sir, the tragedy, begins where nature has been cruel enough to split the personality, to shatter its harmony by imprisoning a noble and ardent spirit within a body not fit for the stresses of life. Have you heard of Leopardi, Engineer, or you, Lieutenant? An unhappy poet of my own land, a crippled, ailing man, born with a great soul, which his sufferings were constantly humiliating and dragging down into the depths of irony — its lamentations rend the heart to hear.

Is not life in itself a thing of goodness, irrespective of whether the course it takes for us can be called a 'happy' one?