1,085 Quotes by Marcel Proust

How often have I watched, and longed to imitate when I should be free to live as I chose, a rower who had shipped his oars and lay flat on his back in the bottom of the boat, letting it drift with the current, seeing nothing but the sky gliding slowly by above him, his face aglow with a foretaste of happiness and peace!

And from that instant I did not have to take another step; the ground moved forward under my feet in that garden where for so long my actions had ceased to require any control, or even attention, from my will. Habit had come to take me in her arms and carry me all the way up to my bed like a little child.

Laat ons de knappe vrouwen overlaten aan fantasieloze mannen.

L'habitude! aménageuse habile mais bien lente et qui commence par laisser souffrir notre esprit pendant des semaines dans une installation provisoire; mais que malgré tout il est bien heureux de trouver, car sans l'habitude et réduit à ses seuls moyens il serait impuissant à nous rendre un logis habitable.

If the idea of death during this period had, as we have seen, cast a gloom over love, the memory of love had for a long time now helped me not to be afraid of death. For I understood that dying was not something new but quite the reverse, that since my childhood I had already died a number of times.

In het leven van de meeste vrouwen is alles, zelfs het ergste verdriet, uiteindelijk een kwestie van passen.

... bij alles wat het stempel draagt van de werkelijke dood, die zo verschilt van zijn logische en abstracte mogelijkheid ...

Porque la mejor parte de nuestra memoria está fuera de nosotros, en una brisa húmeda de lluvia, en el olor cerrado de un cuarto o en el perfume de una primera llamarada: allí dondequiera que encontremos esa parte de nosotros mismos de que no dispuso, que desdeñó nuestra inteligencia, esa postrera reserva del pasado, la mejor, la que nos hace llorar una vez más cuando parecía agotado todo el llanto.

What had to move - a leaf of the chestnut tree, for instance - moved.