Metaphors are our way of losing ourselves in semblances or treading water in a sea of seeming.
Interpretation
Metaphors help us navigate complex ideas and emotions, but can also lead to confusion or detachment from reality.
In this quote, Roberto Bolano suggests that metaphors serve as tools for understanding the world around us by creating connections between seemingly unrelated concepts. However, he warns that relying too heavily on these figurative expressions can result in a disconnection from the true nature of reality, leading us to merely 'tread water' rather than engage deeply with life.
In practice
In a speech about creativity, one might use this quote to emphasize the power of language in shaping our perceptions.
Coincidence obeys no laws and if it does we don't know what they are. Coincidence, if you'll permit me the simile, is like the manifestation of God at every moment on our planet. A senseless God making senseless gestures at his senseless creatures. In that hurricane, in that osseous implosion, we find communion.
The sky, at sunset, looked like a carnivorous flower.
I'd obviously never heard of the group, but my ignorance in literary matters is to blame for that (every book in the world is out there waiting to be read by me).
Every book in the world is out there waiting to be read by me.
Bright colours in the west, giant butterflies dancing as night crept like a cripple toward the east.
Being alone makes us stronger. Thatβs the honest truth. But itβs cold comfort, since even if I wanted company no one will come near me anymore.
Bad promises are better broken than kept.
A good society is characterised not just by liberty but by mutual respect and responsibility. When this breaks down it takes a lot more than police officers to put things right.
The acceptance of all that God has given us and the willingness to let it go - to give it back to him at a moment's notice - that's true human freedom.
Iconic Paris tells us: here are our three-star attractions, go thou and marvel. And so we gaze obediently at what we are told to gaze at, without exactly asking why.
There are not a few among the disciples of charity who require, in their vocation, scarcely less excitement than the votaries of pleasure in theirs.
He that gives quickly gives twice.
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