Jostein Gaarder Quotes

Quotes about:

• An answer is always on the stretch of road that is behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Way Forward, Answers, Behind You

  22 Copy quote

• Life is both sad and solemn. We are led into a wonderful world, we meet one another here, greet each other---and wander together for a brief moment. Then we lose each other and disappear as suddenly and unreasonably as we arrived.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Together, World, Life Is

  24 Copy quote

• How terribly sad it was that people are made in such a way that they get used to something as extraordinary as living.

  Jostein Gaarder

  People, Way, Used

  37 Copy quote

• A state that does not educate and train women is like a man who only trains his right arm.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Women, Equality, Doe

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.86, Hachette UK

  49 Copy quote

• A hydrogen atom in a cell at the end of my nose was once part of an elephant's trunk. A carbon atom in my cardiac muscle was once in the tail of a dinosaur.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Cells, Elephants, Hydrogen Atom

  43 Copy quote

• You can never know if a person forgives you when you wrong them. Therefore it is existentially important to you. It is a question you are intensely concerned with. Neither can you know whether a person loves you. It’s something you just have to believe or hope. But these things are more important to you than the fact that the sum of the angles in a triangle is 180 degrees. You don't think about the law of cause and effect or about modes of perception when you are in the middle of your first kiss.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Believe, Love You, Kissing

  38 Copy quote

• Life consists of a long chain of coincidences.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Long, Coincidence, Chains

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.194, Hachette UK

  8 Copy quote

• The most subversive people are those who ask questions.

  Jostein Gaarder

  People, Subversive, Asks

  23 Copy quote

• Yes, we too are stardust.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Stardust

  "Sofies verden (Sophie's World)". Book by Jostein Gaarder, 1994.

  4 Copy quote

• When we look up at the sky, we are trying to find the way to ourselves.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Sky, Trying, Looks

  13 Copy quote

• Superstitious." What a strange word. If you believed in Christianity or Islam, it was called "faith". But if you believed in astrology or Friday the thirteenth it was superstition! Who had the right to call other people's belief superstition?

  Jostein Gaarder

  Friday, Astrology, People

  36 Copy quote

• I sat thinking how terribly sad it was that people are made in such a way that they get used to something as incredible as living. One day we suddenly take the fact that we exist for granted - and then, yes, then we don’t think about it anymore until we are about to leave the world again.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Thinking, People, One Day

  Jostein Gaarder (2003). “The Solitaire Mystery”, p.362, Macmillan

  20 Copy quote

• The question of whether a thing is right or wrong, good or bad, must always be considered in relation to a persons needs.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Needs, Relation, Persons

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.62, Hachette UK

  22 Copy quote

• Life is short for those who are truly able to understand that one day the entire world will come to a complete end. Not everyone is capable of that. Not everyone has the ability to comprehend what going away for all eternity really implies. There are too many distractions, hour by hour, minute by minute, to hinder such an understanding.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Life Is Short, Understanding, One Day

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “The Orange Girl”, p.71, Hachette UK

  13 Copy quote

• Acting responsibly is not a matter of strengthening our reason but of deepening our feelings for the welfare of others.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Feelings, Acting, Matter

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.240, Hachette UK

  9 Copy quote

• Where both reason and experience fall short, there occurs a vacuum that can be filled by faith.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Fall, Vacuums, Reason

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.282, Hachette UK

  5 Copy quote

• When we gaze at a star in the Milky Way which is 50,000 light-years away from our sun, we are looking back 50,000 years in time." "The idea is much too big for my little head." "The only way we can look out into space, then, is to look back in time. We can never know what the universe is like now. We only know what it was like then. When we look up at a star that is thousands of light-years away, we are really traveling thousands of years back in the history of space.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Stars, Light, Years

  11 Copy quote

• Health is the natural condition. When sickness occurs, it is a sign that Nature has gone off course because of a physical or mental imbalance. The road to health for everyone is through moderation, harmony, and a 'sound mind in a sound body'.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Mind, Balance, Sound Body

  "Sophie's World". Book by Jostein Gaarder, 1995.

  20 Copy quote

• Wasn’t it extraordinary to be in the world right now, wandering around in a wonderful adventure!

  Jostein Gaarder

  Adventure, Wandering Around, World

  21 Copy quote

• Wisest is she who knows she does not know.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Philosophy, Science, Doe

  Jostein Gaarder (2010). “Sophie's World”, p.66, Hachette UK

  10 Copy quote

• There are five billion people living on this planet. But you fall in love with one particular person, and you won't swap her for any other.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Falling In Love, People, Planets

  Jostein Gaarder (2003). “The Solitaire Mystery”, p.82, Macmillan

  12 Copy quote

• The rearing of children is considered too important to be left to the individual and should be the responsibility of the state.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Children, Responsibility, Important

  8 Copy quote

• To prove religious faith by human reason is rationalistic claptrap.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Religious, Reason, Prove

  5 Copy quote

• I believe there is something of the divine mystery in everything that exists. We can see it sparkle in a sunflower or a poppy. We sense more of the unfathomable mystery in a butterfly that flutters from a twig--or in a goldfish swimming in a bowl. But we are closest to God in our own soul. Only there can we become one with the greatest mystery of life. In truth, at very rare moments we can experience that we ourselves are that divine mystery.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Believe, Butterfly, Swimming

  75 Copy quote

• It's not a silly question if you can't answer it.

  Jostein Gaarder

  Silly, Answers, Ifs

  12 Copy quote

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