“I love my work with a frenetic and perverse love, as an ascetic loves the hair shirt which scratches his belly.”
Work
“Poetry is as precise a thing as geometry.”
PoetryAll Quotes by Gustave Flaubert
“The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you feel rise in you a challenge to life, and the promise of future accomplishments.”
Future“The heart, like the stomach, wants a varied diet.”
Diet“There is no truth. There is only perception.”
Truth“Poetry is as precise a thing as geometry.”
Poetry“Art requires neither complaisance nor politeness nothing but faith, faith and freedom.”
Art“Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.”
Work“The cult of art gives pride one never has too much of it.”
Art“Life must be a constant education one must learn everything, from speaking to dying.”
Education“The better a work is, the more it attracts criticism it is like the fleas who rush to jump on white linens.”
Work“Success is a consequence and must not be a goal.”
Success“The future is the worst thing about the present.”
Future“Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything.”
Art“To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.”
Happiness“Oh, if I had been loved at the age of seventeen, what an idiot I would be today. Happiness is like smallpox: if you catch it too soon, it can completely ruin your constitution.”
Age“Happiness is a monstrosity! Punished are those who seek it.”
Happiness“Our ignorance of history causes us to slander our own times.”
History“I believe that if one always looked at the skies, one would end up with wings.”
Nature“The true poet for me is a priest. As soon as he dons the cassock, he must leave his family.”
Family“One must always hope when one is desperate, and doubt when one hopes.”
Hope