36 Quotes by Kamel Daoud

Arab-ness is like Negro-ness, which only exists in the white man’s eyes.

There’s no geography in this story. Generally speaking, it takes place in three settings of national importance: the city, whether that one or another one; the mountains, where you take refuge when you’re attacked or you want to make war; and the village, which is for each and every one of us the ancestral home.

Silence. I hate that word. Its multiple definitions make a lot of noise. Every time the world falls silent, the sound of raspy breathing comes back to my memory.

Maybe someone who dies at the age of a hundred doesn't feel anything more than the fear that grips us when we're six and it's nighttime and our mother comes in to turn out the light.

To be the child of a place that never gave you birth …

Musa was an Arab replaceable by a thousand others of his kind, or by a crow, even, or a reed, or whatever else.

And let’s not forget the cigarette. His eternal cigarette, connecting him to heaven by the fine coil of smoke twisting and rising above him.

C'est important de donner un nom à un mort, autant qu'à un nouveau-né.

La religion pour moi est un transport collectif que je ne prends pas. J’aime aller vers ce Dieu, à pied s’il le faut, mais pas en voyage organisé.