Muriel Barbery - The Elegance of the Hedgehog (2006)

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People aim for the stars, and they end up like goldfish in a bowl. I wonder if it wouldn't be simpler just to teach children right from the start that life is absurd.

Muriel Barbery
I'll be searching for those moments of always within never. Beauty, in this world." - Paloma

Muriel Barbery
Music plays a huge role in my life. It is music that helps me to endure... well... everything there is to endure.

Muriel Barbery
If you want to heal Heal others And smile or weep At this very happy reversal of fate

Muriel Barbery
When illness enters a home, not only does it take hold of a body. It also weaves a dark web between hearts, a web where hope is trapped.

Muriel Barbery
If you dread tomorrow, it's because you don't know how to build the present, you tell yourself you can deal with it tomorrow, and it's a lost cause anyway because tomorrow always ends up becoming today, don't you see?

Muriel Barbery
With the exception of love, friendship and the beauty of art, I don't see much else that can nurture human life.

Muriel Barbery
What makes the strength of a soldier isn't the energy he uses trying to intimidate the other guy by sending him a whole lot of signals, it's the strength he's able to concentrate within himself, by staying centered.

Muriel Barbery
When something is bothering me, I seek refuge. No need to travel far; a trip to the realm of literary memory will suffice. For where can one find more noble distraction, more entertaining company, more delightful enchantment than in literature?

Muriel Barbery
The only purpose of cats is that they constitute mobile decorative objects.

Muriel Barbery
We never look beyond our assumptions and what's worse, we have given up trying to meet others; we just meet ourselves.

Muriel Barbery
This morning I understand what it means to die: when we disappear, it is the others who die for us, for here I am, lying on a cold pavement and it is not the dying I care about; it has no more meaning this morning that it did yesterday. But never again will I see those I love, and if that is what dying is about then it really is the tragedy they say it is.

Muriel Barbery
Just as teardrops, when they are large and round and compassionate, can leave a long strand washed clean of discord, the summer rain as it washes away the motionless dust can bring to a person's soul something like endless breathing.

Muriel Barbery
The strong ones among humans do nothing. They talk and talk again.

Muriel Barbery