José Saramago Quotes

147 Sourced Quotes

The sceptics, who are many and stubborn, claim that, when it comes to human nature, if it is true that the opportunity does not always make the thief, it is also true that it helps a lot.

José Saramago
With the passing of time, as well as the social evolution and genetic exchange, we ended up putting our conscience in the colour of blood and in the salt of tears, and, as if that were not enough, we made our eyes into a kind of mirror turned inwards, with the result that they often show without reserve what we are verbally trying to deny.

José Saramago
Each part in itself constitutes the whole to which it belongs.

José Saramago
Whether we like it or not, the one justification for the existence of all religions is death, they need death as much as we need bread to eat.

José Saramago
The bread was dry and hard, only a scraping of butter was left, he was out of milk, all he had was some rather mediocre coffee, as we know, a man who had never found a woman who would love him enough to agree to join him in this hovel, such a man, apart from rare exceptions which have no place in this story, will never be more than a poor devil, it's odd that we always say poor devil and never poor god...

José Saramago
The habit of falling hardens the body, reaching the ground, to in itself, is a relief.

José Saramago
The beginning is never the clear, precise end of a thread, the beginning is a long, painfully slow process that requires time and patience in order to find out in which direction it is heading, a process that feels its way along the path ahead like a blind man the beginning is just the beginning, what came before is night on worthless.

José Saramago
Even the strongest spirits have the moments of irresistible weakness,

José Saramago
For human words are like shadows, and shadows are incapable of explaining light and between shadow and light there is the opaque body from which words are born..

José Saramago
That is the dream, I suppose, of all novelists—that one of their characters will become 'somebody.'

José Saramago
I believe myself to be the type of person who does not complicate his life. I have always lived my life without dramatizing things, whether the good things that have happened to me or the bad. I simply live those moments. Of course, if I feel sorrow, I feel it, but I do not . . . Let me say it another way: I do not look for ways of being interesting.

José Saramago
In the end, I am quite normal. I don't have odd habits. I don't dramatize. Above all, I do not romanticize the act of writing. I don't talk about the anguish I suffer in creating. I do not have a fear of the blank page, writer's block, all those things that we hear about writers. I don't have any of those problems, but I do have problems just like any other person doing any other type of work.

José Saramago
One of the great fallacies of our age is democratic discourse.

José Saramago
We know that happiness is short-lived, that we fail to cherish it when it is within our grasp and value it only when it has vanished forever.

José Saramago
The church has never been asked to explain anything, our speciality, along with ballistics, has always been the neutralisation of the overly curious mind through faith.

José Saramago
It is strange how the elderly fall silent when they ought to go on speaking, obliging the young to learn everything from scratch.

José Saramago
Death has no need to be cruel, taking people's lives is more than enough.

José Saramago
It takes little or nothing to undo reputations, the merest trifle makes and remakes them, it is simply a question of finding the best means of engaging the confidence or interest of those who are to become one's unsuspecting echoes or accomplices.

José Saramago
Strictly speaking, we do not make decisions. Decisions make us.

José Saramago
No human being can achieve all he or she desires in this life except in dreams, so good night all.

José Saramago
Often when you ask for one thing you receive another, this is the mysterious thing about prayer, we address them to heaven with some private intention, but they choose their own path, sometimes they delay, allowing other prayers to overtake them, frequently they overlap and become hybrid prayers of dubious origin, which quarrel and argue among themselves.

José Saramago
Men are angels born without wings, nothing could be nicer than to be born without wings and to make them grow.

José Saramago
Perfect moments, especially when they verge on the sublime have the grave disadvantage of being very short lived, which in fact, being obvious, we would not need to mention were it not that they have a still greater disadvantage, which is that we do not know what to do once they are over.

José Saramago
Today's bread does not eliminate yesterday's hunger, much less that of tomorrow.

José Saramago
The much-quoted immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary occurred but once so that the world might know that Almighty God, when He so chooses, has no need of men, though He cannot dispense with women.

José Saramago
The ear has to be educated if one wishes to appreciate musical sounds, just as the eyes must learn to distinguish the value of words.

José Saramago
A stomach accustomed to hunger is satisfied with very little.

José Saramago