Michel Houellebecq Quotes

Quotes about:

• Irony won't save you from anything; humour doesn't do anything at all. You can look at life ironically for years, maybe decades; there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the funny side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. Doesn't matter how brave you are, or how reserved, or how much you've developed a sense of humour, you still end up with your heart broken. That's when you stop laughing.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Heart, Years, People

  30 Copy quote

• Those who think they know me are simply lacking in information.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Thinking, Information, Lacking

  9 Copy quote

• Anything can happen in life, especially nothing.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Anything Can Happen, Happens

  Michel Houellebecq (2003). “Platform: A Novel”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

  31 Copy quote

• Those who love life do not read. Nor do they go to the movies, actually. No matter what might be said, access to the artistic universe is more or less entirely the preserve of those who are a little fed up with the world.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Love Life, World, Littles

  "The myth maker" by Michel Houellebecq, www.theguardian.com. June 3, 2005.

  29 Copy quote

• The dream of all men is to meet little sluts who are innocent but ready for all forms of depravity—which is what, more or less, all teenage girls are.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Girl, Dream, Teenage

  Michel Houellebecq (2006). “The Possibility of an Island”, p.144, Vintage

  24 Copy quote

• To the end, I will remain a child of Europe, of worry and of shame. I have no message of hope to deliver. For the West, I do not feel hatred. At most I feel a great contempt. I know only that every single one of us reeks of selfishness, masochism and death. We have created a system in which it has simply become impossible to live, and what's more, we continue to export it.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Children, Europe, Worry

  Michel Houellebecq (2003). “Platform: A Novel”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

  25 Copy quote

• Just like unrestrained economic liberalism, and for similar reasons, sexual liberalism produces phenomena of absolute pauperization. Some men make love every day; others five or six times in their life, or never. Some make love with dozens of women, others with none. It’s what’s known as ‘the law of the market’… In a totally liberal sexual system certain people have a varied and exciting erotic life; others are reduced to masturbation and solitude.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Men, Law, People

  Michel Houellebecq (2011). “Whatever: A Novel”, p.99, Profile Books

  16 Copy quote

• The great advantage of a novel is you can put in whatever comes into your head - it has the same shape as the human brain.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Brain, Shapes, Advantage

  "The passion killer" by Jonathan Romney, www.theguardian.com. June 15, 2000.

  56 Copy quote

• There is no point in asking me general questions because I am always changing my mind.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Mind, Asking, Changing My Mind

  "Houellebecq acquitted of insulting Islam". www.theguardian.com. October 22, 2002.

  10 Copy quote

• Not having anything around to read is dangerous: you have to content yourself with life itself, and that can lead you to take risks.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Risk, Dangerous

  Michel Houellebecq (2003). “Platform: A Novel”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

  10 Copy quote

• Tenderness is a deeper instinct than seduction, which is why it is so hard to give up hope.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Giving Up, Seduction, Instinct

  19 Copy quote

• The world outside had its own rules, and those rules were not human.

  Michel Houellebecq

  World, Humans

  Michel Houellebecq (2001). “The Elementary Particles”, p.285, Vintage

  26 Copy quote

• The love of a dog is a pure thing. He gives you a trust which is total. You must not betray it.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Dog, Giving, Betray

  25 Copy quote

• It is interesting to note that the "sexual revolution" was sometimes portrayed as a communal utopia, whereas in fact it was simply another stage in the historical rise of individualism. As the lovely word "household" suggests, the couple and the family would be the last bastion of primitive communism in liberal society. The sexual revolution was to destroy these intermediary communities, the last to separate the individual from the market. The destruction continues to this day.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Couple, Interesting, Community

  "The Elementary Particles". Book by Michel Houellebecq, August 24, 1998.

  8 Copy quote

• I've lived so little that I tend to imagine I'm not going to die; it seems improbable that human existence can be reduced to so little; one imagines, in spite of oneself, that sooner or later something is bound to happen. A big mistake. A life can just as well be both empty and short. The days slip by indifferently, leaving neither trace nor memory; and then all of a sudden they stop.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Memories, Mistake, Leaving

  Michel Houellebecq (2011). “Whatever: A Novel”, p.46, Profile Books

  19 Copy quote

• If life is an illusion it's a pretty painful one.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Life Is, Painful, Illusion

  9 Copy quote

• To increase desires to an unbearable level whilst making the fulfillment of them more and more inaccessible: this was the single principle upon which Western society was based.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Desire, Unbearable, Principles

  Michel Houellebecq (2006). “The Possibility of an Island”, p.57, Vintage

  10 Copy quote

• The Americans are completely stupid. The intellectual level in any single European country is higher than in America.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Country, Stupid, America

  27 Copy quote

• People are suspicious of single men on vacation, after they get to a certain age: they assume that they're selfish, and probably a bit pervy. I can't say they're wrong.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Selfish, Men, Vacation

  Michel Houellebecq (2003). “Platform: A Novel”, Alfred a Knopf Incorporated

  13 Copy quote

• Beds last on an average much longer than marriages.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Average, Bed, Lasts

  Michel Houellebecq (2011). “Whatever: A Novel”, p.101, Profile Books

  7 Copy quote

• The absence of the will to live is, alas, not sufficient to make one want to die.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Boredom, Want, Absence

  25 Copy quote

• The terrible predicament of a beautiful girl is that only an experienced womanizer, someone cynical and without scruple, feels up to the challenge. More often than not, she will lose her virginity to some filthy lowlife in what proves to be the first step in an irrevocable decline.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Beautiful, Girl, Cynical

  Michel Houellebecq (2001). “The Elementary Particles”, p.61, Vintage

  37 Copy quote

• Without beauty a girl is unhappy because she has missed her chance to be loved. People do not jeer at her, they are not cruel to her, but it is as if she were invisible, no eyes follow her as she walks. People feel uncomfortable when they are with her. They find it easier to ignore her. A girl who is exceptionally beautiful, on the other hand, who has something which too far surpasses the customary seductive freshness of adolescence, appears somehow unreal. Great beauty seems invariably to portend some tragic fate.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Beautiful, Girl, Eye

  Michel Houellebecq (2001). “The Elementary Particles”, p.61, Vintage

  16 Copy quote

• When you read the Koran, you give up. At least the Bible is very beautiful because Jews have an extraordinary literary talent.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Beautiful, Giving Up, Talent

  10 Copy quote

• It's a curious idea to reproduce when you don't even like life.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Ideas, Curious

  Michel Houellebecq (2001). “The Elementary Particles”, p.281, Vintage

  20 Copy quote

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