The anguish of the neurotic individual is the same as that of the saint. The neurotic, the saint are engaged in the same battle. Their blood flows from similar wounds. But the first one gasps and the other one gives.
Georges BatailleRead
We want to decipher skies and paintings, go behind these starry backgrounds or these painted canvases and, like kids trying to find a gap in a fence, try to look through the cracks in the world.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote encourages curiosity and the pursuit of deeper understanding beyond surface appearances.
Georges Bataille's quote metaphorically expresses the human desire to explore and comprehend the complexities of the world around us. By likening our pursuit of knowledge to children peering through cracks in a fence, it emphasizes the innate curiosity that drives us to look beyond the obvious and seek deeper truths behind the façade of reality, whether in nature or art.
Themes
CuriosityUnderstandingExplorationKnowledgeArt
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about art appreciation, this quote can highlight the importance of deeper observation.
More from Georges Bataille
All quotes →A judgment about life has no meaning except the truth of the one who speaks last, and the mind is at ease only at the moment when everyone is shouting at once and no one can hear a thing.
Georges BatailleRead
I believe that truth has only one face: that of a violent contradiction.
Georges BatailleRead
What does physical eroticism signify if not a violation of the very being of its practitioners? – A violation bordering on death, bordering on murder?
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It is clear that the world is purely parodic, that each thing seen is the parody of another, or is the same thing in a deceptive form.
Georges BatailleRead
I think that knowledge enslaves us, that at the base of all knowledge there is a servility, the acceptation of a way of life wherein each moment has meaning only in relation to another or others that will follow it.
Georges BatailleRead
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