Quotes by Gustave Flaubert

“He dreamed of funeral love, but dreams crumble and the tomb abides”

“But that which fanaticism formerly promised to the elect, science now accomplishes for all men. ”

“Maybe happiness too is a metaphor invented on a day of boredom”

“As for the piano, the faster her fingers flew over it, the more he marveled. She struck the keys with aplomb and ran from one end of the keyboard to the other without a stop.”

“When one does something, one must do it wholly and well. Those bastard existences where you sell suet all day and write poetry at night are made for mediocre minds – like those horses that are equally good for saddle and carriage, the worst kind, that can neither jump a ditch nor pull a plow.”

“Sometimes, in a daze, they completely dismantled the cadaver, then found themselves hard put to it to fit the pieces together again.”

“It’s hard to communicate anything exactly and that’s why perfect relationships between people are difficult to find.”

“What wretched poverty of language! To compare stars to diamonds!”