Amin Maalouf Quotes

Every individual is a meeting ground for many different allegiances, and sometimes these loyalties conflict with one another and confront the person who harbors them with difficult choices ~ Amin Maalouf

All pleasures must be paid for, do not despise those that state their price. ~ Amin Maalouf

I no more believe in simplistic solutions than I do in simplistic identieties. The world is a complex machine that can't be dismantled with a srewdriver. But that shouldn't prevent us from observing, from trying to understand, from discussing, and sometimes suggesting a subject for reflection. ~ Amin Maalouf

Life is like a fire. Flames which the passer-by forgets. Ashes which the wind scatters. A man lived. ~ Amin Maalouf

Our ancestors derived less from life than we do, but they also expected much less and were less intent on controlling the future. We are of the arrogant generations who believe a lasting happiness was promised to us at birth. Promised? By whom? ~ Amin Maalouf

The truth is rarely buried; it is merely lying in wait behind veils of modesty, pain, or indifference; the one necessary prerequisite is a passionate desire to lift the veils. ~ Amin Maalouf

It's not often in life that you can misbehave for the good of the cause ~ Amin Maalouf

What makes me myself rather than anyone else is the very fact that I am poised between two countries, two or three languages, and several cultural traditions. It is precisely this that defines my identity. Would I exist more authentically if I cut off a part of myself ~ Amin Maalouf

It seems clear that the Arab East still sees the West as a natural enemy. Against that enemy, any hostile action-be it political, military, or based on oil-is considered no more than legitimate vengeance. And there can be no doubt that the schism between these two worlds dates from the Crusades, deeply felt by the Arabs, even today, as an act of rape ~ Amin Maalouf

During my youth, the idea of moving from Lebanon was unthinkable. Then I began to realise I might have to go, like my grandfather, uncles and others who left for America, Egypt, Australia, Cuba. ~ Amin Maalouf

Isn't it a characteristic of the age we live in that it has made everyone in a way a migrant and a member of a minority? ~ Amin Maalouf

Taking the line of least resistance, we lump the most different people together under the same heading. Taking the line of least resistance, we ascribe to them collective crimes, collective acts and opinions. "The Serbs have massacred…", "The English have devastated…", "The Jews have confiscated…", "The Blacks have torched", "The Arabs refuse…". We blithely express sweeping judgments on whole peoples, calling them "hardworking" and "ingenious", or "lazy", "touchy", "sly", "proud", or "obstinate". And sometimes this ends in bloodshed."

– Amin Maalouf "On Identity ~ Amin Maalouf

Why should we take the diversity of human cultures less seriously than the diversity of animal or plant species? Ought not our just desire to preserve our environment extend to the human environment itself? Our world would be a dreary place, both from the natural and from the cultural point of view, if the only surviving species were those we consider "useful," together with a few we judge to be decorative or that have acquired symbolic value. ~ Amin Maalouf

Mosul, the native city of the historian Ibn al-Athir, was the capital of Jazira, or Mesopotamia, the fertile plain watered by the two great rivers Tigris and Euphrates. It was a political, cultural, and economic centre of prime importance. The Arabs boasted of its succulent fruit: its apples, pears, grapes, and pomegranates. The fine cloth it exported - called 'muslin', a word derived from the city's name - was known throughout the world. At the time of the arrival of the Franj, the people of the emir Karbuqa's realm were already exploiting another natural resource, which the traveller Ibn Jubayr was to describe with amazement a few dozen years later: deposits of naphtha. This precious dark liquid, which would one day make the fortune of this part of the world, already offered travellers an unforgettable spectacle. ~ Amin Maalouf

For it is often the way we look at other people that imprisons them within their own narrowest allegiances. And it is also the way we look at them that may set them free. ~ Amin Maalouf

We die, just as we were born, at the edge of a road not of our choosing. ~ Amin Maalouf

I come from no country, from no city, no tribe. I am the son of the road ... all tongues and all prayers belong to me. But I belong to none of them. ~ Amin Maalouf

Few doctrines throughout History have been able to eradicate hatred, most of them have simply tried to deflect it from one object to another: to the infidel, the foreigner, the apostate, the master, the slave, the father. Naturally, hatred is only called hatred when we see it in others; the hatred which is in ourselves bears a thousand different names. ~ Amin Maalouf

When faced with a chaotic and convoluted situation, one always thinks that it will take centuries to sort it out. Suddenly a man appears and as if by magic, the tree we thought was doomed takes on new life and starts bearing leaves and fruits and giving shade. (Shireen in Samarkand) ~ Amin Maalouf

Life is not so long that one can grow tired of it ~ Amin Maalouf

What strange times we live in, when good must disguise itself in the tawdry rags of evil! ~ Amin Maalouf

Someone other than I might have used the word "roots". It is not part of my vocabulary. I don't like the word, and I like even less the image it conveys. Roots burrow into the ground, twist in the mud, and thrive in darkness; they hold trees in captivity from their inception and nourish them at the price of blackmail: "Free yourself and you'll die ~ Amin Maalouf

You can't say history teaches us this or that; it gives us more questions than answers, and many answers to every question. ~ Amin Maalouf

God, she was beautiful - my first image of the Orient - a woman such as only the desert poet knew how to praise: her face was the sun, her hair the protecting shadow, her eyes fountains of cool water, her body the most slender of palm-trees and her smile a mirage. ~ Amin Maalouf

I have always thought that Heaven invented all the problems, and Hell the solutions. ~ Amin Maalouf

Can we reconcile indefinitely these two imperatives: the desire to preserve every individual's special identity and the need for Europeans to be able to communicate with one another all the time and as freely as possible? We cannot leave it to time to solve the dilemma and prevent people from engaging, a few years hence, in bitter and fruitless linguistic conflicts. We know all too well what time will do.
The only possible answer is a voluntary policy aimed at strengthening linguistic diversity and based on a simple idea: nowadays everybody obviously needs three languages. The first is his language of identity; the third is English. Between the two we have to promote a third language, freely chosen, which will often but not always be another European language. This will be for everyone the main foreign language taught at school, but it will also be much more than that
the language of the heart, the adopted language, the language you have married, the language you love. ~ Amin Maalouf

I despise the zeal of the devout, but I have never said that the One is two.
I am not one of those for whom faith is simply fear of judgement. How do I pray? I study a rose, I count the stars, I marvel at the beauty of the creation and how perfectly ordered it is, at man, the most beautiful work of the Creator, his brain thirsting for knowledge, his heart for love, and his senses, all his senses alert or gratified. ~ Amin Maalouf

Clawing its way towards us, the ugliness of the world tore away our hiding-place. ~ Amin Maalouf

...it's better to wake up amid the pangs of desire than amid those of remorse. ~ Amin Maalouf

When a man is rich, whether in gold or in knowledge, he must treat the poverty of others with consideration. ~ Amin Maalouf

The pursuit of origins is a way of rescuing territory from death and oblivion, a reconquest that ought to be patient, devoted, relentless and faithful. ~ Amin Maalouf

Let us thank God for having made us this gift of death, so that life is to have meaning; of night, that day is to have meaning; silence, that speech is to have meaning; illness, that health is to have meaning; war, that peace is to have meaning. Let us give thanks to Him for having given us weariness and pain, so that rest and joy are to have meaning. Let us give thanks to him, whose wisdom is infinite. ~ Amin Maalouf

A life spent writing has taught me to be wary of words. Those that seem clearest are often the most treacherous. ~ Amin Maalouf

Are you certain that a man's life begins with his birth? ~ Amin Maalouf

I, Hasan the son of Muhammad the weigh-master, I, Jean-Leon de Medici, circumcised at the hand of a barber and baptized at the hand of a pope, I am now called the African, but I am not from Africa, nor from Europe, nor from Arabia. I am also called the Granadan, the Fassi, the Zayyati, but I come from no country, from no city, no tribe. I am the son of the road, my country is the caravan, my life the most unexpected of voyages. ~ Amin Maalouf

Nothing is born of nothing, least of all knowledge, modernity, or enlightened thought; progress is made in tiny surges, in successive laps, like an endless relay race. But there are links without which nothing would be passed on, and for that reason, they deserve the gratitude of all who benefited from them. ~ Amin Maalouf

The past is bound to be fragmentary, bound to be reconstructed, bound to be reinvented. It serves only to collect the truths of today. If our present is the child of the past, our past is the child of the present. And the future will be the harvester of our bastard offspring. ~ Amin Maalouf

Virtue becomes unhealthy if it is not softened by some misdemeanors, and faith quickly becomes cruel if is not subdued by certain doubts. ~ Amin Maalouf

What's a year in comparison with eternity? what's a day? an hour? a second? Such measures have meaning only for a heart that's still beating. ~ Amin Maalouf

Yes indeed, both Muslim and Jewish!I, her father, am Muslim, at least on paper; her mother is Jewish, at least in theory. With us, religion is transmitted through the father; among Jews, through the mother. Therefore, according to the Muslims, Nadia was Muslim; according to the Jews, she was Jewish. She herself might have chosen one or the other, or neither, she chose to be both at once ... Yes, both at once and more. She was proud of all the bloodlines that had converged in her, roads of conquest or exile from central Asia, Anatolia, the Ukraine, Arab, Bessarabia, Armenia, Bavaria ... She refused to divide out her blood, her soul. ~ Amin Maalouf

Don't be so timid! When you were a child, didn't you speak out the truth that the oldest ones kept secret? Well, you were right then. You must find the time of innocence in yourself again, because that was also the time of courage. ~ Amin Maalouf

Perhaps writing only arouses the passions in order to allay them, as beaters flush out the game in order to expose it to the hunter's arrows. ~ Amin Maalouf

Is there a difference between being the midwife of truth, or the midwife of legends? ~ Amin Maalouf

We are not just visitors on this planet, it belongs to us just as we belong to her, its past is ours, so is its future. ~ Amin Maalouf

It's the relationship I have with the world: always trying to escape from reality. I'm a daydreamer; I don't feel in harmony with my epoch or the societies I live in. ~ Amin Maalouf

People often see themselves in terms of whichever one of their allegiances is most under attack. And sometimes, when a person doesn't have the strength to defend that allegiance, he hides it. Then it remains buried deep down in the dark, awaiting its revenge. But whether he accepts or conceals it, proclaims it discreetly or flaunts it, it is with that allegiance that the person concerned identifies. And then, whether it relates to color, religion, language or class, it invades the person's whole identity. Other people who share the same allegiance sympathize; they all gather together, join forces, encourage one another, challenge "the other side." For them, "asserting their identity" inevitably becomes an act of courage, of liberation.

In the midst of any community that has been wounded agitators naturally arise… The scene is now set and the war can begin. Whatever happens "the others" will have deserved it.

[…]

What we conveniently call "murderous folly" is the propensity of our fellow-creatures to turn into butchers when they suspect that their "tribe" is being threatened. The emotions of fear or insecurity don't always obey rational considerations. They may be exaggerated or even paranoid; but once a whole population is afraid, we are dealing with the reality of the fear rather than the reality of the threat. ~ Amin Maalouf

I have the profoundest respect for people who behave in a generous way because of religion. But I come from a country where the misuse of religion has had catastrophic consequences. One must judge people not by what faith they proclaim but by what they do. ~ Amin Maalouf

A community begins to fall apart the moment it agrees to abandon the weakest of its members. ~ Amin Maalouf

As an artist, it's a great opportunity to play a character like this [Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland]. And then, as a person, I had never been to the African continent. So, I knew, personally, it would reshape me. ~ Forest Whitaker

Amin, you're not making sense to me. Things have always been this way, since the beginning of time. Some die so others can be saved. You don't believe in the salvation of others? ~ Yasmina Khadra

Listen to me, Amin," I said slowly. "Listen to me very carefully. Nothing is the same. Nothing will ever be the same again. There lives on this earth a woman who can be my friend and my lover. Do you understand that? Do you understand what a marvelous thing that is?"
"A friend is a friend," Uthman interrupted, "and a woman is a woman. You can't have them in one person. The whole world knows that."
"If that's what the whole world knows, ... then the whole world is wrong. I believed the whole world, and I lost her. ~ Barbara Cohen

Kindness holds the key to the secret of our own transformation and, in the process, of the transformation of the world. ~ Jean Maalouf

His Excellency, President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin Dada, VC, DSO, MC, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Seas and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular. ~ Idi Amin

Since Idi Amin was from the Sudanese section in the north of Uganda, he was darker skinned. He had more of a blue undertone. So, we did change the coloring of my skin to be closer to his. But otherwise, there were no transformations besides acting. ~ Forest Whitaker

I certainly don' think I could've played the character [Idi Amin] the same way without being in Uganda. I loved working in Uganda. ~ Forest Whitaker

Although some people felt Adolf Hitler was bad, he was a great man and a real conqueror whose name would never be forgotten. ~ Idi Amin

Amin hid nothing. Everybody knew everything. Yet the American Senate only introduced a resolution breaking off trade with Amin three months before his overthrow. ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

I myself consider myself the most powerful figure in the world. ~ Idi Amin

It's not for me. I tried human flesh and it's too salty for my taste. ~ Idi Amin

Since Modi's Mumbai sign-off, much commentary has been focused on the brand-dilution potential inherent in its scandals. MS Dhoni doesn't think we should worry: 'IPL as a brand can survive on its own.' Shilpa Shetty, 'brand ambassador' of the Rajasthan Royals, tweets that we should: 'Custodians of Cricket must not hamper d Brandvalue of this viable sport.' Hampering d Brandvalue, insists new IPL boss Chirayu Amin, is the furthest thing from his mind: 'IPL's brand image is strong and nobody can touch that.' Harsha Bhogle, however, frets for the nation: 'Within the cricket world, Brand India will take a hit.'

Not much more than a week after Modi's first tell-all tweets, the media was anxiously consulting Brand Finance's managing director, Unni Krishnan. Had there been any brand dilution yet? It was, said the soothsayer gravely, 'too early to say'. He could, however, confirm the following: 'The wealth that can be created by the brand is going to be substantially significant for many stakeholders. A conducive ecosystem has to be created to move the brand to the next level… We have to build the requisite bandwidth to monetise these opportunities.' Er, yeah… what he said. Anyway, placing a value on the IPL brand has clearly been quite beneficial to Brand Finance's brand. ~ Gideon Haigh

I'm a good Muslim and I'm only interested in Islam. ~ Idi Amin

Kindness can reach the deepest call of the heart and soul, and lead to a different kind of world and self. ~ Jean Maalouf

Your experience will be a lesson to all of us men to be careful not to marry ladies in very high positions. ~ Idi Amin

The only legitimate antidote for self-doubt and the shameful weakness it breeds is joyful self-acceptance. ~ Idi Amin

Amin knew that neither West nor East would criticize him for fear that he would support the other side. He felt he was untouchable and he said so openly. ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

Arabs, rise as one man and fight for your sacred rights. Kill the Jews wherever you find them. This pleases God, history, and religion. This saves your honor. God is with you. ~ Haj Amin Al-Husseini

He's passing the ball like Idi Amin. ~ Alan Parry

Sometimes people mistake the way I talk for what I am thinking. ~ Idi Amin

I do not want to be controlled by any superpower. I myself consider myself the most powerful figure in the world, and that is why I do not let any superpower control me. ~ Idi Amin

I declare a holy war, my Moslem brothers! Murder the Jews! Murder them all. ~ Haj Amin Al-Husseini

Because I was playing Idi Amin, who dealt with the colonisation issue, I became aware of this internalised conflict of what it means to be torn between cultures, what it means to be taken over by other cultures. ~ Forest Whitaker

Mal'akh was dragging Langdon across the living room when the congregation declared, "Amen!" Amon, Mal'akh corrected. Egypt is the cradle of your religion. The god Amon was the prototype for Zeus ... for Jupiter ... and for every modern face of God. To this day, every religion on earth shouted out a variation of his name. Amen! Amin! Aum! ~ Dan Brown

It's the camel's nose in the tent. Look at Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot, Idi Amin
every one of these monsters, on seizing power, their first act was to confiscate all firearms in private hands ... ~ Charlton Heston

I was pretty much consumed by this character. Even when I was off, I was continually searching to find something else new about [Idi] Amin, and to embed myself deeper into the culture to the point that, in the end, I was so entrenched that I could tell what tribe someone was from just by looking at them. ~ Forest Whitaker

I propose getting rid of conventional armaments and replacing them with reasonably priced hydrogen bombs that will be distributed equally throughout the world. ~ Idi Amin

As things now stand, everything is up for grabs. Nevertheless: Napalming babies is bad. Starving the poor is wicked. Buying and selling each other is depraved. Those who stood up to and died resisting Hitler, Stalin, Amin, and Pol Pot - and General Custer too - have earned salvation. Those who acquiesced deserve to be damned. There is in the world such a thing as evil. [All together now:] Sez who? God help us.6 ~ David Baggett

You cannot run faster than a bullet ~ Idi Amin

There is freedom of speech, but I cannot guarantee freedom after speech ~ Idi Amin

No king establishes a kingdom without pouring blood of a nation. ~ Auliq Ice

He was decisive and wholehearted in everything he did, so intent non the task at hand that he never looked over his shoulder, even if his cloak got caught in a thorny bush. When he did turn to speak to somebody, he used to swing his entire body and dress him full face. When he shook hands, he was never the first to withdraw his own. He inspired such confidence that he was known as al-Amin, the Reliable One. ~ Karen Armstrong

Saladin had the same immediate successor as all the great Muslim leaders of his time: civil war. Barely had he died that his empire was dismembered. ~ Amine Maalouf

I was a good soldier in the British Army. I was born in a very, very poor family. And I enlisted to escape hunger. But my officers were Scottish and they loved me. The Scots are good, you know. ~ Idi Amin

Amin is the shame of the whole world. The fact that he managed to rule so long and commit so many crimes was only possible thanks to the hypocrisy of the East and the West who were waging the Cold War for world domination. ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

I have to keep law and order and it means that I have to kill my enemies before they kill me. ~ Idi Amin

You know history better than I do, you've been teaching all your life. Without real opposition you get dictators down the line. Idi, Amin, Mugabe. No democracy without opposition. ~ Nadine Gordimer

The biggest mistake which humans make is when they don't try again: Remember! There's always a second chance ~ Waqas Amin

He killed his enemies because he was afraid they would kill him. Amin ordered entire tribes to be put to death, because he feared they would rebel. ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

I think the place fed me completely. Not only was I in Uganda, but I was around many people who had a personal relationship with Idi Amin. I was eating the food constantly. I was culturally hanging out with the people. You can't help but absorb the energy, and try to get inside the culture. ~ Forest Whitaker

All cultures seem to find a slightly alien local population to carry the Hermes projection. For the Vietnamese it is the Chinese, and for the Chinese it is the Japanese. For the Hindu it is the Moslem; for the North Pacific tribes it was the Chinook; in Latin America and in the American South it is the Yankee. In Uganda it is the East Indians and Pakistanis. In French Quebec it is the English. In Spain the Catalans are "the Jews of Spain". On Crete it is the Turks, and in Turkey it is the Armenians. Lawrence Durrell says that when he lived in Crete he was friends with the Greeks, but that when he wanted to buy some land they sent him to a Turk, saying that a Turk was what you needed for a trade, though of course he couldn't be trusted.
This figure who is good with money but a little tricky is always treated as a foreigner even if his family has been around for centuries. Often he actually is a foreigner, of course. He is invited in when the nation needs trade and he is driven out - or murdered - when nationalism begins to flourish: the Chinese out of Vietnam in 1978, the Japanese out of China in 1949, the Jankees out of South America and Iran, the East Indians out of Uganda under Idi Amin, and the Armenians out of Turkey in 1915-16. The outsider is always used as a catalyst to arouse nationalism, and when times are hard he will always be its victim as well. ~ Lewis Hyde

Kindness is about energy we give and take from all creatures. The bottom line is the integrative interaction and the total interconnectedness between human beings, all creatures, and God. Kindness is a spirituality of solid truth, not shifting emotion; of justice, not occasional philanthropy; of genuine love, not sentimentality or masochism; of evolved adults, not fixated infants. ~ Jean Maalouf

Germany is the place where when Hitler was the prime minister and supreme commander, he burned over six million Jews. This is because Hitler and all German people knew that Israelis are not people who are working in the interest of the world and that is why they burned the Israelis alive with gas in the soil of Germany. ~ Idi Amin

SO NOW IT'S 1979. Year of the Goat. The Earth Goat. Here are some things you might remember. Margaret Thatcher had just been elected prime minister. Idi Amin had fled Uganda. Jimmy Carter would soon be facing the Iran hostage crisis. In the meantime, he was the first and last president ever to be attacked by a swamp rabbit. That man could not catch a break. ~ Karen Joy Fowler

Good and evil has no passport; it speaks in different tongues, wears many skins, and exists everywhere, even in the same person ~ A.H. Amin

More than anything else, kindness is a way of life. It is a way of living and walking through life. It is a way of dealing with all that is-our selves, our bodies, our dreams and goals, our neighbors, our competitors, our enemies, our air, our earth, our animals, our space, our time, and our very consciousness. Do we treat all creation with kindness? Isn't all creation holy and divine? ~ Jean Maalouf

I want to be remembered as a great athlete. As a boxing champion. ~ Idi Amin

I noticed long ago that Amin has the tendency to concentrate power in his own hands but I did not attach any particular significance to this. However, recently this tendency has become dangerous. ~ Nur Muhammad Taraki