Marcel Proust, (1871-1922), French Novelist Quotes

The past not merely is not fugitive, it remains present.

Just as those who practice the same profession recognize each other instinctively, so do those who practice the same vice.

There can be no peace of mind in love, since the advantage one has secured is never anything but a fresh starting-point for further desires.

The "sensitiveness" claimed by neurotics is matched by their egotism: they cannot abide the flaunting by others of the sufferings to which they pay an even increasing amount of attention in themselves.

It is seldom indeed that one parts on good terms, because if one were on good terms one would not part.

Everybody calls "clear" those ideas which have the same degree of confusion as his own.

We must never be afraid to go too far, for success lies just beyond.

It is a mistake to speak of a bad choice in love, since, as soon as a choice exists, it can only be bad.

People of the world are so imbued with their own stupidity that they can never believe that one of their own has talent. They appreciate only people of letters who are not of their world.

There is probably not one person, however great his virtue, who cannot be led by the complexities of life’s circumstances to a familiarity with the vices he condemns the most vehemently—without his completely recognizing this vice which, disguised as certain events, touches him and wounds him: strange words, an inexplicable attitude, on a given night, of the person whom he otherwise has so many reasons to love.