All Quotes

“κακῶς ἀκούειν οὐ μέλει θανόντι μοι. Dishonour will not trouble me, once I am dead.”

“βροτοῖς ἅπασι κατθανεῖν ὀφείλεται, κοὐκ ἔστι θνητῶν ὅστις ἐξεπίσταται τὴν αὔριον μέλλουσαν εἰ βιώσεται· τὸ τῆς τύχης γὰρ ἀφανὲς οἷ προβήσεται, κἄστ᾿ οὐ διδακτὸν οὐδ᾿ ἁλίσκεται τέχνῃ. Death is the common debt of man; no mortal really knows if he will live to see the morrow's light; for Fortune's issues are not in our ken, beyond the teacher's rule they lie, no art can master them.”

“τὸν καθ᾿ ἡμέραν βίον λογίζου σόν, τὰ δ᾿ ἄλλα τῆς τύχης. Count the present day thine own, the rest to Fortune yield.”

“The idea that to make a man work you've got to hold gold in front of his eyes is a growth, not an axiom. We’ve done that for so long that we've forgotten there’s any other way. "Amory Blaine" in This Side of Paradise (1920) Bk. 2, Ch. 5”

“Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft, where we are hard, cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand. "The Rich Boy" (1926), paragraph 3.”

“The rich are different.”

“There are no second acts in American lives. The Last Tycoon , "Hollywood, ETC.," ed. Edmund Wilson”

“Faint winds, and far away a fading laughter... And the rain and over the fields a voice calling...”

“The shadow of a dove Falls on the cote, the trees are filled with wings; And down the valley through the crying trees The body of the darker storm flies; brings With its new air the breath of sunken seas And slender tenuous thunder . . . But I wait . . . Wait for the mists and for the blacker rain”

“I simply state that I'm a product of a versatile mind in a restless generation”

“He doesn't believe that public swimming”

“A big man has no time really to do anything but just sit and be big.”

“People try so hard to believe in leaders now, pitifully hard. But we no sooner get a popular reformer or politician or soldier or writer or philosopher”

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

“Verde que te quiero verde. Verde viento. Verdes ramas. El barco sobre la mar y el caballo en la montaña. Green, how I want you green. Green wind. Green branches. The ship out on the sea and the horse on the mountain. " Romance Sonámbulo " from Primer romancero gitano”

“Verte desnuda es recordar la Tierra. To see you naked is to recall the Earth. " Casidas ," IV: Casida de la Mujer Tendida from Primeras Canciones”

“Theory and Play of the Duende”

“I feel my belief in sacrifice and struggle getting stronger. I despise the kind of existence that clings to the miserly trifles of comfort and self”

“The 26th of July Movement is not a tendency within the party, it is the revolutionary apparatus of Chibas's organization, a grass”

“Weapons for what? ( ¿Armas, para qué? ) To fight against whom? Against the revolutionary government, that has the support of the whole people? ... Weapons for what? Hiding weapons for what? To blackmail the President of the Republic? To threaten to break the peace here? To create organizations of gangsters ? Is it that we are going to return to gangsterism? Is it that we will return to daily shootouts in the capital? Weapons for what? Speech in Havana”

“I am not a dictator , and I do not think I will become one. I will not maintain power with a machine gun . I Won't Be a Dictator , interview with Ruth Lloyd (January 1959), printed in The Spokesman”

“Men do not shape destiny . Destiny produces the man for the hour. I Won't Be a Dictator”

“The American people, I think, is good people. Yes, they are”

“I am not a communist and neither is the revolutionary movement, but we do not have to say that we are anticommunists just to fawn on foreign powers. Resignation announcement”

“The first duty of the revolutionaries is to tell the truth. Fooling the people, promoting illusions, always brings the worst consequences , and I believe that the people should be warned against excessive optimism. How did the Red Army win the war? By telling the truth. How did the dictatorship lose the war? By deceiving the soldiers. Camp Columbia, Havana (Jan. 8th, 1959), Fidel Castro Reader , pp. 133”

“A revolution is not a trail of roses .... A revolution is a fight to the death between the future and the past . Speech on the second anniversary of the triumph of the revolution”

“El amor pasa, y la incompatibilidad permanece”

“El hombre es desdichado porque no sabe que es feliz”

“El hombre teme la muerte porque ama la vida”

“Enamorarse no es amar. Puede uno enamorarse y odiar”