Victor Hugo Quotes - Page 21

• I will be Chateaubriand or nothing.

  Victor Hugo

  Victor Hugo (2007). “Hugo's Works: Last Days of a Condemned and Life of Victor Hugo”, Wildside Press LLC

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• It is those books which a man possesses but does not read which constitute the most suspicious evidence against him.

  Victor Hugo

  Book, Men, Doe

  VICTOR HUGO (1866). “TOILERS OF THE SEA”, p.9

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• The poetic element lying hidden in most women is the source of their magnetic attraction.

  Victor Hugo

  Lying, Elements, Poetic

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• "Animals are happy," said the queen. "They run no risk of going to hell." "They are there already," replied Josiana.

  Victor Hugo

  Running, Animal, Risk

  "The Man Who Laughs: L'Homme Qui Rit".

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• He does not weep who does not see.

  Victor Hugo

  Doe, Cry, Weeping

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• A library implies an act of faith which generations, still in darkness hid, sign in their night in witness of the dawn.

  Victor Hugo

  Night, Darkness, Library

  Victor Hugo (1897). “Selected Poems from the Edition Definitive”

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• The mother...swinging the children by pulling on a length of string, while at the same time she kept and eye on them with that protective watchfulness, half animal, half angelic, which is the quality of motherhood.

  Victor Hugo

  Mother, Children, Eye

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• If you wish to understand what Revolution is, call it Progress; and if you wish to understand what Progress is, call it Tomorrow.

  Victor Hugo

  Wish, Progress, Revolution

  Victor Hugo, Charles Edwin Wilbour (1987). “Les misérables”, Dutton Adult

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• From the oyster to the eagle, from the swine to the tiger, all animals are to be found in men and each of them exists in some man, sometimes several at the time. Animals are nothing but the portrayal of our virtues and vices made manifest to our eyes, the visible reflections of our souls. God displays them to us to give us food for thought.

  Victor Hugo

  Nature, Eye, Animal

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• I am not in the world to care for my life, but for souls.

  Victor Hugo

  Wisdom, Soul, World

  Victor Hugo (1863). “Les misérables”, p.21

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• If you are leaving that sorrowful place with hate and anger against men, you are worthy of compassion; if you leave it with good will, gentleness and peace, you are better than any of us.

  Victor Hugo

  Hate, Men, Compassion

  Victor Hugo (1994). “Les Miserables Volume One”, p.54, Wordsworth Editions

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• In love, such a word, whispered, is a mysterious kiss of the soul to the soul.

  Victor Hugo

  Kissing, Soul, Mysterious

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• One only needs to see a smile in a white crape bonnet in order to enter the palace of dreams.

  Victor Hugo

  Dream, White, Order

  Victor Hugo (18??). “Les miserables. Pt. 1”

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• Son, brother, father, lover, friend. There is room in the heart for all the affections, as there is room in heaven for all the stars.

  Victor Hugo

  Love, Brother, Stars

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• Popularity? It's glory's small change.

  Victor Hugo

  Small Changes, Recognition, Popularity

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• With a tiny bit of effort, the nettle would be useful; if you neglect it, it becomes a pest. So then we kill it. How many men are like nettles My friends, there is no such thing as a weed and no such thing as a bad man. There are only bad cultivators.

  Victor Hugo

  Weed, Men, Effort

  Victor Hugo (2008). “Les Misérables”, Random House LLC

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• Love is like a tree: it grows by itself, roots itself deeply in our being and continues to flourish over a heart in ruin. The inexplicable fact is that the blinder it is, the more tenacious it is. It is never stronger than when it is completely unreasonable.

  Victor Hugo

  Heart, Love Is, Roots

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• What is fright by night is curiosity by day.

  Victor Hugo

  Night, Curiosity, Fright

  Victor Hugo (1994). “Les Miserables Volume Two”, p.635, Wordsworth Editions

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• Love resembles a tree: it bends under its own weight, deeply rooted in our being and sometimes turns green in the ruins of a heart.

  Victor Hugo

  Heart, Tree, Weight

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• Can human nature ever be wholly and radically transformed? Can the man whom God made good be made wicked by man? Can the soul be reshaped in its entirety by destiny and made evil because destiny is evil? Can the heart become misshapen and afflicted with ugly, incurable deformities under disproportionate misfortune, like a spinal column bent beneath a too low roof?

  Victor Hugo

  Heart, Destiny, Men

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• Nothing can be sadder or more profound than to see a thousand things for the first and last time. To journey is to be born and die each minute...All the elements of life are in constant flight from us, with darkness and clarity intermingled, the vision and the eclipse; we look and hasten, reaching out our hands to clutch; every happening is a bend in the road...and suddenly we have grown old. We have a sense of shock and gathering darkness; ahead is a black doorway; the life that bore us is a flagging horse, and a veiled stranger is waiting in the shadows to unharness us.

  Victor Hugo

  Horse, Journey, Hands

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• Dry happiness is like dry bread. We eat, but we do not dine. I wish for the superfluous, for the useless, for the extravagant, for the too much, for that which is not good for anything.

  Victor Hugo

  Wish, Extravagance, Useless

  Victor Hugo (1863). “Les misérables”

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• The death agony of the barricade was about to begin.For, since the preceding evening, the two rows of houses in the Rue de la Chanvrerie had become two walls; ferocious walls, doors closed, windows closed, shutters closed. A house is an escarpment, a door is a refusal, a facade is a wall. This wall hears, sees and will not. It might open and save you. No. This wall is a judge. It gazes at you and condemns you. What dismal things are closed houses.

  Victor Hugo

  Wall, Doors, Agony

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• All that was neither a city, nor a church, nor a river, nor color, nor light, nor shadow: it was reverie. For a long time, I remained motionless, letting myself be penetrated gently by this unspeakable ensemble, by the serenity of the sky and the melancholy of the moment. I do not know what was going on in my mind, and I could not express it; it was one of those ineffable moments when one feels something in himself which is going to sleep and something which is awakening.

  Victor Hugo

  Sleep, Color, Sky

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• To introduce a new play only six weeks after another has been banned is also a way to speak one's piece to the government. It proves that art and liberty can grow back in one night under the clumsy foot which crushes them.

  Victor Hugo

  Crush, Art, Night

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