Vladimir Nabokov Quotes

Quotes about:

• Mind you, sometimes the angels smoke, hiding it with their sleeves, and when the archangel comes, they throw the cigarettes away: that’s when you get shooting stars.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Stars, Angel, Mind

  107 Copy quote

• Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Inspirational, Rain, Fall

  109 Copy quote

• Life is just one small piece of light between two eternal darknesses.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Two, Light, Darkness

  57 Copy quote
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  Loneliness as a situation can be corrected, but as a state of mind it is an incurable illness.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Loneliness, Mind, Illness

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov”, p.464, Vintage

  77 Copy quote
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  And the rest is rust and stardust.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Rust, Stardust

  Vladimir Nabokov (2016). “Lolita”, p.142, Hamilton Books

  110 Copy quote

• Curiosity is insubordination in its purest form.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Curiosity, Form, Insubordination

  "Reading Lolita in Tehran". Book by Azar Nafisi, 2003.

  97 Copy quote

• Genius is finding the invisible link between things.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Genius, Links, Invisible

  23 Copy quote

• The breaking of a wave cannot explain the whole sea.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Sea, Wave, Breaking Promises

  Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (2008). “The Real Life of Sebastian Knight”, p.105, New Directions Publishing

  66 Copy quote
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  Perhaps, somewhere, some day, at a less miserable time, we may see each other again.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  May, Miserable

  Vladimir Nabokov (2016). “Lolita”, p.57, Hamilton Books

  66 Copy quote

• It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Love, Valentines Day, Sight

  Vladimir Nabokov (2016). “Lolita”, p.149, Hamilton Books

  57 Copy quote

• Toska - noun /ˈtō-skə/ - Russian word roughly translated as sadness, melancholia, lugubriousness. "No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Spiritual, Sadness, Sick

  104 Copy quote

• I cannot conceive how anybody in his right mind should go to a psychoanalyst.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Mind, Should

  Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (1973). “Strong opinions”, McGraw-Hill Companies

  9 Copy quote

• Play! Invent the world! Invent reality!

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Reality, Play, World

  Vladimir Nabokov (2012). “Look at the Harlequins!”, Penguin UK

  27 Copy quote

• Only one letter divides the comic from the cosmic.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Letters, Comic, Cosmic

  22 Copy quote

• We live not only in a world of thoughts, but also in a world of things. Words without experience are meaningless.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  World, Meaningless

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “The Annotated Lolita: Revised and Updated”, p.255, Vintage

  14 Copy quote

• Life is a message scribbled in the dark.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Dark, Messages, Life Is

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “Pale Fire”, p.36, Vintage

  10 Copy quote

• Knowing you have something good to read before bed is among the most pleasurable of sensations.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Book, Reading, Knowing

  112 Copy quote

• Nothing revives the past so completely as a smell that was once associated with it.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Nature, Past, Smell

  17 Copy quote
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  Let all of life be an unfettered howl. Like the crowd greeting the gladiator. Don't stop to think, don't interrupt the scream, exhale, release life's rapture.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Thinking, Crowds, Life Is

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov”, p.46, Vintage

  65 Copy quote

• Which arrow flies for ever? The arrow that has hit its mark.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Arrows, Mark

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov”, p.389, Vintage

  12 Copy quote

• Existence is a series of footnotes to a vast, obscure, unfinished masterpiece.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Inspirational, Funny, Life

  Pale Fire "Commentary" (1962)

  20 Copy quote

• I think it is all a matter of love: the more you love a memory, the stronger and stranger it is.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Love, Memories, Thinking

  Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (1973). “Strong opinions”, McGraw-Hill Companies

  77 Copy quote

• The writer's job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Jobs, Writing, Character

  90 Copy quote
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  I have no desires, save the desire to express myself in defiance of all the world’s muteness.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Desire, World, Defiance

  Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (1960). “Invitation to a beheading: a novel”, Putnam Adult

  73 Copy quote

• The contemplation of beauty, whether it be a uniquely tinted sunset, a radiant face, or a work of art, makes us glance back unwittingly at our personal past and juxtapose ourselves and our inner being with the utterly unattainable beauty revealed to us.

  Vladimir Nabokov

  Art, Sunset, Past

  Vladimir Nabokov (2011). “The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov”, p.97, Vintage

  54 Copy quote

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