Heinrich Böll Quotes

• Behind every word a whole world is hidden that must be imagined. Actually, every word has a great burden of memories, not only just of one person but of all mankind. Take a word such as bread, or war; take a word such as chair, or bed or Heaven. Behind every word is a whole world. I'm afraid that most people use words as something to throw away without sensing the burden that lies in a word.

  Heinrich Böll

  Memories, War, Lying

  66 Copy quote

• One ought to go too far, in order to know how far one can go.

  Heinrich Böll

  Order, Know How, Ought

  Translated in "Germany Today: A Personal Report" by Walter Laqueur, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, (p. 130), 1985.

  61 Copy quote

• If the dead could speak there would be no more war.

  Heinrich Böll

  War, Would Be, Speak

  Heinrich Böll, Leila Vennewitz (1986). “The Stories of Heinrich Böll”, p.339, Northwestern University Press

  35 Copy quote

• Behind every word a whole world is hidden that must be imagined.

  Heinrich Böll

  World, Behinds, Whole

  42 Copy quote

• I am a clown...and I collect moments.

  Heinrich Böll

  Moments, Clown

  37 Copy quote

• I don't trust Catholics," I said, "because they take advantage of you." "And Protestants?" he asked with a laugh. "I loathe the way they fumble around with their consciences." "And atheists?" He was still laughing. "They bore me because all they ever talk about is God.

  Heinrich Böll

  Atheist, Laughing, Catholic

  Heinrich Böll (1965). “The clown”, Avon Books

  34 Copy quote

• If you want to do something... get up and actually do it!

  Heinrich Böll

  Determination, Want, Get Up

  29 Copy quote

• I need very little reality.

  Heinrich Böll

  Reality, Needs, Littles

  22 Copy quote

• Strangely enough I like the kind to which I belong: people.

  Heinrich Böll

  People, Kind, Enough

  Heinrich Böll (1965). “The clown”, Avon Books

  26 Copy quote

• Humor is really one of the hardest things to define, very hard. And it's very ambiguous. You have it or you don't. You can't attain it. There are terrible forms of professional humor, the humorists' humor. That can be awful. It depresses me because it is artificial. You can't always be humorous, but a professional humorist must. That is a sad phenomenon.

  Heinrich Böll

  Depressing, Humorous, Awful

  35 Copy quote

• A child... never takes time off as a child; time off does not begin until the principles of order have been accepted.

  Heinrich Böll

  Children, Order, Principles

  Heinrich Böll (1965). “The clown”, Avon Books

  28 Copy quote

• An artist is like a woman who can do nothing but love, and who succumbs to every stray male jackass.

  Heinrich Böll

  Artist, Males, Jackasses

  Heinrich Böll (1965). “The clown”, Avon Books

  28 Copy quote

• Oh, that ludicrous virile earnestness!

  Heinrich Böll

  Seriousness, Earnestness

  Heinrich Böll (1984). “What's to Become of the Boy?, Or, Something to Do with Books”, p.40, Northwestern University Press

  20 Copy quote

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