PREMIUM FEATURE
Advanced Search Filters
Filter search results by source, date, and more with our premium search tools.
Is there any more cruel inadvertence or ordeal in nature Picture the tragedy of that longing, the inaccessible so nearly attained, the transparent … - Maurice Maeterlinck
" "Is there any more cruel inadvertence or ordeal in nature Picture the tragedy of that longing, the inaccessible so nearly attained, the transparent fatality, the impossible with not a visible obstacle! . . . It would be insoluble, like our own tragedy upon this earth, were it not that an unexpected element is mingled with it. Did the males foresee the disillusion to which they would be subjected? One thing is certain, that they have locked up in their hearts a bubble of air, even as we lock up in our souls a thought of desperate deliverance. It is as though they hesitated for a moment; then, with a magnificent effort, the finest, the most supernatural that I know of in the annals of the insects and the flowers, in order to rise to happiness they deliberately break the bond that attaches them to life. They tear themselves from their peduncle and, with an incomparable flight, amid pearly beads of gladness, their petals dart up and break the surface of the water. Wounded to death, but radiant and free, they float for a moment beside their heedless brides and the union is accomplished, whereupon the victims drift away to perish, while the wife, already a mother, closes her corolla, in which lives their last breath, rolls up her spiral and descends to the depths, there to ripen the fruit of the heroic kiss.
English
Collect this quote
About Maurice Maeterlinck
Count Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck (29 August 1862 – 6 May 1949) was a Belgian poet, playwright, and essayist who wrote in French, most famous for his work L'Oiseau Bleu (The Blue Bird), and for other works exploring the meaning of life and death. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1911.
Biography information from Wikiquote
Also Known As
Alternative Names:
Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck
Related quotes. More quotes will automatically load as you scroll down, or you can use the load more buttons.
Additional quotes by Maurice Maeterlinck
Enhance Your Quote Experience
Enjoy ad-free browsing, unlimited collections, and advanced search features with Premium.
We have taken for a long time a rather foolish pride in believing ourselves to be miraculous beings, unique and wonderfully open to chance, probably fallen from another world, without clear ties to the rest of life and, in any case, endowed with an unusual, incomparable, awful ability. It is far preferable to be nowhere near so prodigious, for we have learned that prodigies soon vanish in the normal evolution of nature. It is much more consoling to observe that we follow the same path as the soul of this great world, that we have the same ideas, the same hopes, the same trials, and — were it not for our specific dream of justice and pity — almost the same feelings. It is much more calming to assure ourselves that, to better our lot, to utilize the forces, the opportunities, the laws of matter, we employ methods exactly the same as those that the soul uses to illuminate and order its unruly and unconscious areas; that there are no other methods, that we are in the midst of truth, that we are in our rightful place and at home in this universe molded by unknown substances, whose thought is not impenetrable and hostile but analogous or apposite to our own.
Loading...