Reality is a prison, where one vegetates and always will. All the rest - thought, action - is just a pastime, mental or physical. What counts then, is to come to grips with reality. The rest can go.
Cesare PaveseRead
We never remember days, only moments.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Life is made up of moments rather than the passage of time.
This quote emphasizes the idea that our experiences and memories are shaped by significant moments rather than the mere count of days. It suggests that it is the intensity and quality of specific experiences that truly matter in our lives, rather than a chronological record of time passing.
Themes
MomentsMemoryLifeExperienceTime
In practice
Example use cases
This quote is perfect for a speech about making the most of our lives.
More from Cesare Pavese
All quotes →Waiting is still an occupation. It is having nothing to wait for that is terrible.
Cesare PaveseRead
Dawn's faint breath breathes with your mouth at the ends of empty streets. Gray light your eyes, sweet drops of dawn on dark hills. Your steps and breath like the wind of dawn smother houses. The city shudders, Stones exhale— you are life, an awakening. Star lost in the light of dawn, trill of the breeze, warmth, breath— the night is done. You are light and morning.
Cesare PaveseRead
There is mercy for everyone, except those who are bored with life.
Cesare PaveseRead
One does not kill oneself for love of a woman, but because love - any love - reveals us in our nakedness, our misery, our vulnerability, our nothingness.
Cesare PaveseRead
The cadence of suffering has begun. Every evening at dusk, my heart constricts until night has come.
Cesare PaveseRead
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So may'st thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop Into thy mother's lap.
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we are all supposed to think of reasons to live.
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My mother had a horrific life. At fourteen, she was in the Nazi concentration camps. Her sense about life now is, every day above ground is a good day.
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English is the only interesting thing that's left in my life.
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