Herta Muller Quotes

• Suffering doesn't improve human beings, does it?

  Herta Muller

  Suffering, Doe, Humans

  "Herta Muller: a life in books". Interview with Maya Jaggi, www.theguardian.com. November 30, 2012.

  24 Copy quote

• What can't be said can be written. Because writing is a silent act, a labor from the head to the hand.

  Herta Muller

  Writing, Hands, Silent

  22 Copy quote

• Women always need other women to lean on. They become friends in order to hate each other better. The more they hate each other, the more inseparable they become.

  Herta Muller

  Hate, Order, Needs

  19 Copy quote

• In this county, we had to walk, eat, sleep and love in fear.

  Herta Muller

  Fear, Sleep, And Love

  21 Copy quote

• I wanted to get out of our thimble of a town, where every stone had eyes.

  Herta Muller

  Eye, Stones, Towns

  17 Copy quote

• To combat death you don't need much of a life, just one that isn't yet finished.

  Herta Muller

  Needs, Combat, Just One

  20 Copy quote

• I have always written only for myself - to clarify things, to clarify things with myself, to understand in an inner way what is actually happening.

  Herta Muller

  Way, Happenings, Written

  10 Copy quote

• Once upon a time they had some bad luck, and they blame everything on that.

  Herta Muller

  Once Upon A Time, Luck, Blame

  17 Copy quote

• Anything in literature, including memory, is second-hand.

  Herta Muller

  Memories, Hands, Literature

  "Herta Müller: a life in books". Interview with Maya Jaggi, www.theguardian.com. November 30, 2012.

  22 Copy quote

• Everyday brought me further away from other people, I had been placed out of the world's sight, as if in a cupboard, and I hoped it would stay that way. I developed a yearning for being alone, unkempt, untended.

  Herta Muller

  Sight, People, Everyday

  19 Copy quote

• Language is so different from life. How am I supposed to fit the one into the other? How can I bring them together?

  Herta Muller

  Together, Different, Language

  18 Copy quote

• Some people speak and sing and walk and sit and sleep and silence their homesickness, for a long time, and to no avail. Some say that over time homesickness loses its specific content, that it starts to smolder and only then becomes all-consuming, because it’s no longer focused on a concrete home. I am one of the people who say that.

  Herta Muller

  Home, Sleep, Long

  13 Copy quote

• I have packed myself into silence so deeply and for so long that I can never unpack myself using words. When I speak, I only pack myself a little differently.

  Herta Muller

  Long, Silence, Littles

  "The Hunger Angel". Book by Herta Müller, 2012.

  10 Copy quote

• I'm always telling myself I don't have many feelings. Even when something does affect me I'm only moderately moved. I almost never cry. It's not that I'm stronger than the ones with teary eyes, I'm weaker. They have courage. When all you are is skin and bones, feelings are a brave thing. I'm more of a coward. The difference is minimal though, I just use my strength not to cry. When I do allow myself a feeling, I take the part that hurts and bandage it up with a story that doesn't cry, that doesn't dwell on homesickness.

  Herta Muller

  Hurt, Eye, Differences

  10 Copy quote

• If only the right person would have to leave, everyone else would be able to stay in the country.

  Herta Muller

  Country, Would Be, Able

  8 Copy quote

• When we don't speak, said Edgar, we become unbearable, and when we do, we make fools of ourselves.

  Herta Muller

  Fool, Unbearable, Speak

  7 Copy quote

• If you live with death threats, you need friends. So you have to risk that they might spy on you.

  Herta Muller

  Risk, Spy, Needs

  "Herta Müller: a life in books". Interview with Maya Jaggi, www.theguardian.com. November 30, 2012.

  14 Copy quote

• Writing itself does not know what it looks like while one is doing it, only when it's finished.

  Herta Muller

  Writing, Doe, Looks

  7 Copy quote

• Who can take a single step with his head?

  Herta Muller

  Steps, Action, Single Step

  6 Copy quote

• In Romanian society, I am not particularly well-liked. I don't often receive invitations.

  Herta Muller

  Wells, Invitations

  15 Copy quote

• What can be said about chronic hunger. Perhaps that there's a hunger that can make you sick with hunger. That it comes in addition to the hunger you already feel. That there is a hunger which is always new, which grows insatiably, which pounces on the never-ending old hunger that already took such effort to tame. How can you face the world if all you can say about yourself is that you're hungry.

  Herta Muller

  Sick, Effort, Faces

  9 Copy quote

• Only the demented would not have raised their hands in the great hall. They had exchanged fear for insanity".

  Herta Muller

  Hands, Insanity, Demented

  4 Copy quote

• My flesh was burning where the skin was scraped off my knees, and I was afraid that I couldn't be alive anymore with so much pain, and at the same time I knew I was alive because it hurt. I was afraid that death would find its way into me through this open knee and I quickly covered my knee with my hands.

  Herta Muller

  Hurt, Pain, Hands

  5 Copy quote

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