Absurdity Quotes - Page 19

Basically, at the very bottom of life, which seduces us all, there is only absurdity, and more absurdity. And maybe that's what gives us our joy for living, because the only thing that can defeat absurdity is lucidity.

Albert Camus

Giving, Joy, Defeat

"WIRED Binge-Watching Guide: Fargo" by Jennifer M. Wood, www.wired.com. February 8, 2017.

40 Copy quote

Show source
From now on there is no longer any development immanent to art. The times have passed for history of art with a logical sense. There is no longer even any consistency in absurdities; the development has been wound up, and what comes now already exists: the syncretism of a muddle of all styles and possibilities, post-history.

Arnold Gehlen

Art, Consistency, Style

8 Copy quote
To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct.

Mark Twain

Art, Writing, Together

Mark Twain (2016). “The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories”, p.179, Xist Publishing

21 Copy quote

Show source
Crude absurdities, trivial nonsense, and sublime truths are equally potent in readying people for self-sacrifice if they are accepted as the sole, eternal truth

Eric Hoffer

Truth, Sacrifice, Self

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

8 Copy quote

Show source
English plays, Atrocious in content, Absurd in form, Objectionable in action, Execrable EnglishTheatre.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Play, Action, Absurd

7 Copy quote
You can read a lot about a country by looking at its beaches: across cultures, the beach is that rare public space in which all absurdities and quirky national behaviors can be found.

Martin Parr

Country, Beach, Space

36 Copy quote
Ist es an und fu? r sich absurd, das Nichtsein fu? r einUbel zu ? halten; da jedes Ubel wie jedes Gut das Dasein zur Voraussetzung hat, ja sogar das Bewusstsein. It is in and by itself absurd to regard non-existence as an evil; for every evil, like every good, presupposes existence, indeed even consciousness.

Arthur Schopenhauer

Evil, Hats, Consciousness

1844 DieWelt alsWille undVorstellung (TheWorld asWill and Representation), vol.2, ch.41 (translated by E F J Payne).

8 Copy quote

Show source
Desire is the absurdity that holds open the infinity of possibility.

Wendy Farley

Inspirational, Desire, Infinity

5 Copy quote
To capture the human cost of fallen empire with all its horror and absurdity, Sheets offers the right combination: the political insight of a top reporter and the power of a novelist.

Martin Cruz Smith

Political, Empires, Novelists

4 Copy quote
There are, and always have been, destructive pseudo-scientific notions linked to race and religion; these are the most widespread and damaging. Hopefully, educated people can succeed in shedding light into these areas of prejudice and ignorance, for as Voltaire once said: "Men will commit atrocities as long as they believe absurdities."

Martin Gardner

Believe, Ignorance, Men

"Exclusive Interview with Martin Gardner". Interview with Bernard Sussman, "Southwind" (Miami-Dade Junior College), Volume 3, No. 1, Fall 1968.

7 Copy quote

Show source
FAITH. No one word personifies the absolute worst and most wicked properties of religion better than that. Faith is mind-rot. It’s the poison that destroys critical thinking, undermines evidence, and leads people into lives dedicated to absurdity. It’s a parasite regarded as a virtue. I speak as a representative of the scientific faction of atheism: it’s one thing we simply cannot compromise on. Faith is wrong.

PZ Myers

Thinking, People, Mind

21 Copy quote
Science fiction also provides a sense of nostalgia that is always present when it comes to Palestine, in that whenever we talk about Palestine, it is never in the present, but either remembering a past or imagining a better future. Submitting gritty Middle Eastern politics to high production sci-fi in this manner not only underlines the absurdity of the situation, but brings about a dystopian future scenario.

Larissa Sansour

Past, Nostalgia, Remember

5 Copy quote
Criticism is now become mere hangman's work, and meddles only with the faults of authors ; nay, the critic is disgusted less with their absurdities than excellence ; and you cannot displease him more than in leaving him little room for his malice.

John Dryden

Leaving, Excellence, Criticism

John Dryden, John Mitford (1836). “The Works of John Dryden: In Verse and Prose, with a Life”, p.424

4 Copy quote

Show source
Christianity - An old metaphysical romance, filled with marvels, contradictions, and absurdity, born in the ardent imagination of Orientals, has spread into our Europe. Enthusiasts have purveyed it, careerists have pretended to accept it, imbeciles have believed it.

Frederick The Great

Europe, Imagination, Romance

19 Copy quote
Of all the senseless babble I have ever had occasion to read, the demonstrations of these philosophers who undertake to tell us all about the nature of God would be the worst, if they were not surpassed by the still greater absurdities of the philosophers who try to prove that there is no God.

Thomas Huxley

God, Philosophical, Trying

"On the Hypothesis that Animals Are Automata, and Its History". Essay by Thomas Henry Huxley, mathcs.clarku.edu. 1874.

4 Copy quote

Show source
The reductio ad absurdum is God's favorite argument.

George Tyrrell

Argument, Ads

7 Copy quote
I really like the stuff that is very absurd and very real at the same time. I think Anton Chekhov is the greatest comedy writer of all time. I think he would make a great addition to The Office staff. If you look through Chekhov plays there is a lot of awkward pauses in there. His mixture of pathos, absurdity, truthfulness and whimsy is just mixed together perfectly.

Rainn Wilson

Real, Thinking, Play

Interview with David Hirschman, bigthink.com. November 11, 2010.

8 Copy quote

Show source
Jeffrey Lewis sings as though absurdity were truth, and truth absurdity. And I think I agree with him.

Paul Banks

Thinking, Agree

4 Copy quote
Having become conscious of the truth he once perceived, man now sees only the awfulness or the absurdity of existence, he now understands the symbolic element in Ophelia's fate, he now recognizes the wisdom of the woodland god, Silenus: it nauseates him.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Fate, Men, Nausea

4 Copy quote
A sense of absurdity interferes with my efforts to appear venerable.

Mason Cooley

Effort, Appearance, Interfere

5 Copy quote
Time is an absurdity. An abstraction. The only thing that matters is this moment. This moment a million times over. You have to trust me. If this moment is repeated enough, if you keep trying — and you have to keep trying — eventually you will come across the next item on your list.

Jonathan Nolan

Over You, Trying, Matter

"Memento Mori". Short story by Jonathan Nolan, www.esquire.com. January 29, 2007.

9 Copy quote

Show source
Take away from Genesis the belief that Moses was the author, on which only the strange believe that it is the word of God has stood, and there remains nothing of Genesis but an anonymous book of stories, fables, and traditionary or invented absurdities, or of downright lies.

Thomas Paine

Lying, Believe, Book

Thomas Paine (2016). “THOMAS PAINE Ultimate Collection: Political Works, Philosophical Writings, Speeches, Letters & Biography (Including Common Sense, The Rights of Man & The Age of Reason): The American Crisis, The Constitution of 1795, Declaration of Rights, Agrarian Justice, The Republican Proclamation, Anti-Monarchal Essay, Letters to Thomas Jefferson and George Washington…”, p.450, e-artnow

9 Copy quote

Show source
I think it's really tragic when people get serious about stuff. It's such an absurdity to take anything really seriously ... I make an honest attempt not to take anything seriously: I worked that attitude out about the time I was eighteen, I mean, what does it all mean when you get right down to it, what's the story here? Being alive is so weird.

Frank Zappa

Attitude, Mean, Thinking

"No Commercial Potential: The Saga Of Frank Zappa". Book by David Walley, p. 4, 1972.

5 Copy quote

Show source
Those pointless equations, to which no solution exists, are called absurdities.

Steig Larsson

Equations, Solutions, Pointless

4 Copy quote
The take-home message is that we should blame religion itself, not religious extremism - as though that were some kind of terrible perversion of real, decent religion. Voltaire got it right long ago: 'Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.' So did Bertrand Russell: 'Many people would sooner die than think. In fact they do.

Richard Dawkins

Religious, Real, Believe

Richard Dawkins (2008). “The God Delusion”, p.345, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

16 Copy quote

Show source

You May Also Like Quotes On:

Absurd