641 Quotes by José Saramago

Liking is probably the best form of ownership, and ownership the worst form of liking.

Χωρίς μέλλον το παρόν δεν έχει καμία αξία, είναι σαν να μην υπάρχει".

Oh, I'm not just going too far, I've arrived.

It's there right behind us, it has already reached out a hand to touch us on the shoulder while we are still muttering to ourselves, this is the way fate usually treats.

Words have their own hierarchy, their own protocol, their own artistic titles, their own plebeian stigmas.

Якщо Господь не довіряє людям, які в нього вірують, то я не бачу, чому ці люди мають у нього вірувати.

How can you not know?" Silvestri said again. "Has twelve years of living the way you've been living not shown you how badly people live? The poverty, the hunger, the ignorance, the fear?" "Yes, but times have changed..." "Yes, times have changed, but people haven't.

The only difference between life and death is that the living still have time, but the time to say that one word, to make that one gesture, is running out for them. What gesture, what word, I don't know, a man dies from not having said it, from not having made it, this is what he dies of, not from sickness, and that is why, when dead, he finds it so difficult to accept death. (Jose Saramago, The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis, p 122)

[...] it seems you don’t understand that words are the labels we stick on things, not the things themselves, you’ll never know what the things are really like, nor even what their real names are, because the names you gave them are just that, the names you gave them [...]