Quotes By Gustave Flaubert
Life must be a constant education; one must learn everything, from speaking to dying.
Gustave Flaubert
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.
Gustave Flaubert
You can calculate the worth of a man by the number of his enemies, and the importance of a work of art by the harm that is spoken of it.
Gustave Flaubert
Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.
Gustave Flaubert
Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything.
Gustave Flaubert
Art requires neither complaisance nor politeness; nothing but faith, faith and freedom.
Gustave Flaubert
Do not read, as children do, to amuse yourself, or like the ambitious, for the purpose of instruction. No, read in order to live.
Gustave Flaubert
One mustn't look at the abyss, because there is at the bottom an inexpressible charm which attracts us.
Gustave Flaubert
Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity.
Gustave Flaubert
I love my work with a frenetic and perverse love, as an ascetic loves the hair shirt which scratches his belly.
Gustave Flaubert
But the disparaging of those we love always alienates us from them to some extent. We must not touch our idols; the gilt comes off in our hands.
Gustave Flaubert
I have the handicap of being born with a special language to which I alone have the key.
Gustave Flaubert
To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.
Gustave Flaubert
The deplorable mania of doubt exhausts me. I doubt about everything, even my doubts.
Gustave Flaubert