266 Quotes by Guy de Maupassant

The great artists are those who impose their personal vision upon humanity.

As her figure coarsened, her soul became ever more romantic, and when her corpulence riveted her to her chair, her imagination continued to wander through tender adventures, of which she was the heroine.

Whence come those mysterious influences which change our happiness into discouragement, and our self-confidence into diffidence?

Solitude is indeed dangerous for a working intelligence. We need to have around us people who think and speak. When we are alone for a long time we people the void with phantoms

A human being - what is a human being? Everything and nothing. Through the power of thought it can mirror everything it experiences. Through memory and knowledge it becomes a microcosm, carrying the world within itself. A mirror of things, a mirror of facts. Each human being becomes a little universe within the universe!

A sick thought can devour the body's flesh more than fever or consumption.

Music, this complex and mysterious act, precise as algebra and vague as a dream, this art made out of mathematics and air, is simply the result of the strange properties of a little membrane. If that membrane did not exist, sound would not exist either, since in itself it is merely vibration. Would we be able to detect music without the ear? Of course not. Well, we are surrounded by things whose existence we never suspect, because we lack the organs that would reveal them to us. [Was He Mad?]

La solitude est dangereuse pour les intelligences qui travaillent. Il nous faut autour de nous, des hommes qui pensent et qui parlent. Quand nous sommes seuls longtemps, nous peuplons le vide de fantômes.

Solitude is obviously dangerous for people with active brains. We need men around us who have ideas and like talking. Leave us alone for any length of time, and we start filling the void with supernatural creatures.