Mario Vargas Llosa Quotes - Page 2

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• Revolution will free society of its afflictions, while science will free the individual of his.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Affliction, Revolution, Individual

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “The War of the End of the World”, p.14, Macmillan

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• Death isn't enough. It doesn't remove the stain. But a slap, a whiplash, square on the face, does. Because a man's face is as sacred as his mother or his wife.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Mother, Men, Squares

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “The War of the End of the World”, p.331, Macmillan

  14 Copy quote

• writing fiction is the best thing there is because absolutely everything is possible!

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Writing, Fiction, Writing Fiction

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• There are many things behind a good novel, but in particular there is a lot of work - a lot of patience, a lot of stubbornness, and a critical spirit.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Critical Spirit, Stubbornness, Novel

  Source: www.texasmonthly.com

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• No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Despair, Ephemeral, Matter

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “The Real Life of Alejandro Mayta: A Novel”, p.79, Macmillan

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• Whether religious or racial, anti-Semitism is always repugnant, one of the most destructive manifestations of human stupidity and evil. What is profoundly expressed in it is man's traditional mistrust of the man who is not part of his tribe, that 'other' who speaks a different language, whose skin is a different color, and who participates in mysterious rites and rituals.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Religious, Men, Color

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• Eroticism has its own moral justification because it says that pleasure is enough for me; it is a statement of the individual's sovereignty.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Moral, Enough, Pleasure

  19 Copy quote

• But what do I have? The things I'm told and the things I tell, that's all. And as far as I know, that never yet made anyone fly.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Made, Knows

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “The Storyteller: A Novel”, p.77, Macmillan

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• The truths that seem most truthful, if you look at them from all sides, if you look at them close up, turn out to be either half truths or lies.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Truth, Lying, Looks

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• Prosperity or egalitarianism -- you have to choose. I favor freedom -- you never achieve real equality anyway: you simply sacrifice prosperity for an illusion.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Real, Sacrifice, Equality

  86 Copy quote

• Since it is impossible to know what's really happening, we Peruvians lie, invent, dream and take refuge in illusion. Because of these strange circumstances, Peruvian life, a life in which so few actually do read, has become literary.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Dream, Lying, Strange

  Mario Vargas Llosa (1989). “The Real Life of Alejandro Mayta”, Vintage

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• It is rare and almost impossible for a novel to have only one narrator.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Narrators, Impossible, Novel

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “Letters to a Young Novelist”, p.20, Macmillan

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• I always write a draft version of the novel in which I try to develop, not the story, not the plot, but the possibilities of the plot. I write without thinking much, trying to overcome all kinds of self-criticism, without stopping, without giving any consideration to the style or structure of the novel, only putting down on paper everything that can be used as raw material, very crude material for later development in the story.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Writing, Thinking, Self

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2013). “A Writer's Reality”, p.48, Faber & Faber

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• The worst thing that can happen to an artist is to be subsidized by the state. It leads to an intellectual and artistic castration.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Artist, Intellectual, States

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• That is one thing I am sure of amid my many uncertainties regarding the literary vocation: deep inside, a writer feels that writing is the best thing that ever happened to him, or could ever happen to him, because as far as he is concerned, writing is the best possible way of life, never mind the social, political, or financial rewards of what he might achieve through it.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Writing, Political, Mind

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “Letters to a Young Novelist”, p.3, Macmillan

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• Maintain democracy or go to dictatorship: that is what is at stake in these elections.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Democracy, Election, Stakes

  "Another angry neighbour for Bush" by Simon Tisdall, www.theguardian.com. April 3, 2006.

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• It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Moving, Animal, Rooms

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2011). “The Real Life of Alejandro Mayta: A Novel”, p.278, Macmillan

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• Journalism has been very important for me - for a long time I made my living as a journalist, and it also serves as a source of ideas. Many of the things I have written I would not have written without the experience of being a journalist.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Ideas, Long, Important

  "Interview With Mario Vargas Llosa". Interview with Katharyn Rodemann, www.texasmonthly.com. November 2002.

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• There is an incompatibility between literary creation and political activity.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Political, Creation, Incompatibility

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• We were trained as writers with the idea that literature is something that can change reality, that it's not just a very sophisticated entertainment, but a way to act.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Reality, Ideas, Way

  "Peruvian Writer Mario Vargas Llosa on the Importance of Literature". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. May 31, 2012.

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• I was very young and lived with my grandparents in a villa with white walls in the Calle Ocharan, in Miraflores.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Wall, White, Grandparent

  Mario Vargas Llosa (2012). “Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter”, p.5, Faber & Faber

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• A good novel is a conjunction of many factors, the main of which is without a doubt, hard work.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Hard Work, Doubt, Conjunctions

  Source: www.texasmonthly.com

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• I have a chest full of all the insults, villainies, and infamies a man is capable of withstanding. . . . If you become famous, you will have to go through that.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Men, Insult, Infamy

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• If you are killed because you are a writer, that's the maximum expression of respect, you know.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Respect, Expression, Maximum

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• Reading was such an enrichment of my life. And it was that pleasure that I had as a very young reader probably that is the origin of my vocation.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Reading, Pleasure, Young

  "Peruvian Writer Mario Vargas Llosa on the Importance of Literature". "PBS NewsHour" with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. May 31, 2012.

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