Boris Quotes

How wonderful to be alive, he thought. But why does it always hurt? ~ Boris Pasternak

You said that facts are meaningless, unless meanings are put into them. Well, Christianity, the mystery of the individual, is precisely what must be put into the facts to make them meaningful. ~ Boris Pasternak

Shocked and grieved by sudden death of Adjutant General Sobolev.' She sobbed and blew her nose, then continued reading. "'He will be hard for the Russian army to replace and, of course, this loss is greatly lamented by all true soldiers. It is sad to lose such useful people who are so devoted to their work. Alexander.'" Fandorin raised his eyebrows slightly - the telegram had sounded rather cold to him. "Hard to replace"? Meaning that the general could be replaced after all? "Sad" - and nothing more? "The lying in state and funeral ~ Boris Akunin

I have always thought that art is not a category, not a realm covering innumerable concepts and derivative phenomena, but that, on the contrary, it is something concentrated, strictly limited. It is a principle that is present in every work of art, a force applied to it and a truth worked out in it. And I have never seen art as form but rather as a hidden, secret part of content ... A literary creation can appeal to us in all sorts of ways - by its theme, subject, situations, characters. But above all it appeals to us by the presence in it of art ... You can call it an idea, a statement about life, so all-embracing that it can't be split up into separate words; and if there is so much as a particle of it in any work that includes other things as well, it outweighs all the other ingredients in significance and turns out to be the essence, the heart and soul of the work. ~ Boris Pasternak

A few years after my first son was born, he wanted to know how we chose his name, so I began reading him the story of Noah's Ark. ~ Boris Becker

We did everything we could to break down barriers that restrain poorest. ~ Boris Johnson

We do not have to do anything without you, malish," Boris insisted.
They were in bed, cuddling after dinner as usual, and Hans kissed Thomas on the shoulder. "We aren't children. We can keep our libidos in check for a few hours."
"I don't want you to," Thomas said. "Yes, I'm jealous - of both of you, really. Not just Boris, anymore." Hans wasn't sure what that meant exactly, but he was glad to hear it. "But you're my boys, right?"
"Right," Hans and Boris answered in unison.
"I know Boris loves me. And, Hans… you care for me, don't you?"
"I care for you a lot." Hans wanted to say more than just that, but things weren't there for them. Not yet. Perhaps they never would be. Thomas and Boris were always going to be the couple, and Hans, no matter how long he stayed with them, would always be on the outside. "I feel the same way about Boris," he added truthfully.
Thomas smiled. He put his arms around his two lovers, pulling them close. "We care about you too, puppy."
"A lot," Boris added. ~ Jamie Fessenden

We celebrate the contribution of people who have come to this country to make it better. ~ Boris Johnson

On a Parisienne's Bookshelf
THERE ARE MANY BOOKS ON A PARISIENNE'S BOOKSHELF:

The books you so often claim you've read that you actually believe you have.
The books you read in school from which you remember only the main character's name.
The art books your parents give you each Christmas so you can get some "culture".
The art books that you bought yourself and which you really love.
The books that you've been promising yourself you'll read next summer … for the past ten years.
The books you bought only because you liked the title.
The books that you think makes you cool.
The books you read over and over again, and that evolve along with your life.
The books that remind you of someone you loved.
The books you keep for your children, just in case you ever have any.
The books whose first ten pages you've read so many times you know them by heart.
The books you own simply because you must and, taken together, form intangible proof that you are well read.
AND THEN THERE ARE THE BOOKS YOU HAVE READ, LOVED, AND WHICH ARE A PART OF YOUR IDENTITY:

The Stranger, Albert Camus
The Elementary Particles, Michel Houellebecq
Belle du Seigneur, Albert Cohen
Bonjour Tristesse, Françoise Sagan
Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert
L'Écume des jours, Boris Vian
Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
Les Fleurs du Mal, Charles Baudelaire
Journey to the End of the Night, Louis-Ferdinand C ~ Caroline De Maigret

I'd given up trying to explain Hobie to Boris: the house, the workshop, his thoughtful way of listening (...) but more than anything a sort of pleasing atmosphere of mind: foggy, autumnal, a mild and welcoming micro-climate that made me feel safe and comfortable in his company. ~ Donna Tartt

We have a guy from Switzerland who is just playing the game in a way I haven't seen anyone - and I mean anyone - play before. How fortunate we are to be able to see that. If he stays healthy and motivated - and the wonderful feel he has stays with him - he is the kind of guy who can overtake the greatest. ~ Boris Becker

A quote has an even more powerful effect if we presume not just a particular author behind it, but God, nature, the unconscious, labor, or difference. These are strong fetishes, each conjuring the powerful submedial in a particular way. Yet all of them must nonetheless be exchanged in a certain rhythm according to the laws of the medial economy. In order to create such fetishes, one does not have to use brilliant quotes by famous authors but can use anonymous quotes that stem from the author- less realm of the everyday, lowly, foreign, vulgar, aggressive, or stupid. Precisely such quotes produce the effect of medial sincerity, that is, the revelation of a deeply submerged, hidden, medial plane on the familiar medial surface. It then appears as if this surface had been blasted open from the inside and that the respective quotes had sprung forth from the submedial interior - like aliens. All of this, of course, refers to the economy of the quote as a gift that can be offered, accepted, and reciprocated. ~ Boris Groys

I have come, reluctantly, to the conclusion that Boris [Johnson] cannot provide the leadership or build the team for the task ahead. ~ Michael Gove

He's a gentle soul,' he told her. 'I can't see him put down, he wouldn't hurt a fly.' Indeed Boris wouldn't hurt a fly because in general flies were too fast for him. ~ Livi Michael

You can build a throne with bayonets, but you can't sit on it for long. ~ Boris Yeltsin

Science, as long as it limits itself to the descriptive study of the laws of nature, has no moral or ethical quality and this applies to the physical as well as the biological sciences. ~ Ernst Boris Chain

Girls had never been important. I'd had a girlfriend or two and had liked them a lot but it wasn't love, because my first love was tennis. ~ Boris Becker

Nowadays it would be reasonable to have an annual world championship. ~ Boris Spassky

I can't help it. I'm a cat. ~ Boris Airay The Cheshire Cat

As far as modern writing is concerned, it is rarely rewarding to translate it, although it might be easy. Translation is very much like copying paintings. ~ Boris Pasternak

The tendency of life is not the preservation of the species, but solely the preservation of each individual organism, as long as it is in existence at all, and is able to carry on its life processes. ~ Boris Sidis

International terrorism is throwing down a challenge, and not just to Russia. ~ Boris Yeltsin

A dog can not make this journey alone, but maybe a wolf can. ~ Boris The Goose

The clouds of terror and dictatorship are gathering over the whole country. They must not be allowed to bring eternal night. ~ Boris Yeltsin

Life hasn't just begun. Art never had a beginning. Always, until the moment of its stopping, it was constantly there. It is infinite. It is here, at this moment, behind me and inside me, and, as if the doors of an Assembly Hall were suddenly flung open, I am immersed in its fresh, headlong omnilocality and omnitemporality, as if an oath of allegiance were to be sworn without delay.
No genuine book has a first page. Like the rustling of a forest, it is begotten God knows where, and it grows and it rolls, arousing the dense wilds of the forest until suddenly, in the very darkest, most stunned and panicked moment, it rolls to its end and begins to speak with all the treetops at once. ~ Boris Pasternak

There is no such thing as a good war and there is no such thing as a justified war but there is a war of necessity and we have to fight it if we want to assure our way of life even if it's the wrong one. ~ Boris Zubry

They all laughed and clapped, taking it for a deliberate witticism, while he had no idea what he was saying, so great was his foreboding of misfortune and his feeling of powerlessness over the future, however great his thirst for goodness and his capacity for happiness. ~ Boris Pasternak

Your commanders have ordered you to storm the White House and to arrest me. But I as the elected President of Russia give you the order to turn your tanks and not to fight against your own people. ~ Boris Yeltsin

My love for you is past the mind, beyond my heart, and into my soul. ~ Boris Kodjoe

Meanwhile London Mayor Boris Johnson 'joked' that women only go to university because 'they've got to find men to marry' (hilarious, no?) and ~ Laura Bates

I find that acrylics dry very fast - which is supposed to be its charm; however, I find that because of that quality they don't blend as nicely as the oils. The oils, for one thing, are softer and more flexible than the acrylics. Also, the colors are brighter with oils. ~ Boris Vallejo

In every generation there has to be some fool who will speak the truth as he sees it. ~ Boris Pasternak

Procrastination is a prelude in a minor key. ~ Boris Vian

This was a time to prepare for the cold weather, to store up fire and wood. But in those days of the triumph of materialism, matter had become a disembodied idea, and the problems of alimentation and fuel supply took the place of food and firewood. ~ Boris Pasternak

Even so, one step from my grave, I believe that cruelty, spite, The powers of darkness will in time, Be crushed by the spirit of light. ~ Boris Pasternak

I firmly believe that volunteering is good for our society and brings communities together. It's a fantastic opportunity to get involved in your local community, to meet new people and to gain a sense of pride and achievement. ~ Boris Johnson

I was a professional tennis player in my teens. I played mostly in Europe. I was top 10 in the world in juniors, and then I messed up my back. I had three herniated discs and that put a stop to it. ~ Boris Kodjoe

Vergil waited no longer. He took Boris's sword and plunged it into his chest. Boris went limp gently, as if he were drifting into a nap. Vergil held on to the sword for a second, and then pulled it out of the fallen angel, clutching it with fervor. Sadly, I realized that this wouldn't be the last time great force would have to be used against my fellow angels. I had no words for the rest of them in the Fellowship Hall. My optimism was very low and I saw no sign of the situation getting better. God's angelic host was divided. My friends, scattered. Lucifer's army was intimidating and many of his soldiers were dispersed among us, ready to strike at our most vulnerable moments. I myself was unsure how we were going to succeed. But one thing I did know - we all needed to pray. Unlike Lucifer, I needed God in my life. ~ Julius St. Clair

In some men compassion for a woman goes beyond all conceivable limits. Their responsiveness places her in unrealizable positions, not to be found in the world, existing only in imagination, and on account of her they are jealous of the surrounding air, of the laws of nature, of the millennia that went by before her. ~ Boris Pasternak

The dreadful truth is that when people come to see their MP they have run out of better ideas. ~ Boris Johnson

I do think human beings cannot be faulted for wishing to judge themselves and their lives and their achievements by others around them; that is a natural human feeling. ~ Boris Johnson

They kissed slowly, the human traffic of First Avenue taking them into its indifferent arms, the city's special combination of curiosity and resentment. ~ Boris Fishman

What I really think about Banksy is I think he's a genius; he's a great artist, and I like his stuff. But he's got to accept it if, from time to time, someone will need to paint over his work. ~ Boris Johnson

A literary creation can appeal to us in all sorts of ways-by its theme, subject, situations, characters. But above all it appeals to us by the presence in it of art. It is the presence of art in Crime and Punishment that moves us deeply rather than the story of Raskolnikov's crime. ~ Boris Pasternak

Bobby Fischer has an enormous knowledge of chess and his familiarity with the chess literature of the USSR is immense. ~ Boris Spassky

It was partly the war, the revolution did the rest. The war was an artificial break in life
as if life could be put off for a time
what nonsense! The revolution broke out willy-nilly like a sigh suppressed too long. Everyone was revived, reborn, changed, transformed. You might say that everyone has been through two revolutions
his own, personal revolution as well as the general one. It seems to me that socialism is the sea, and all these separate streams, these private, individual revolutions, are flowing into it
the sea of life, the sea of spontaneity. I said life, but I mean life as you see it in a great picture, transformed by genius, creatively enriched. Only now people have decided to experience it not in books and pictures, but in themselves, not as an abstraction but in practice. ~ Boris Pasternak

Nowadays the dynamic element is more important in chess - players more often sacrifice material to obtain dynamic compensation. ~ Boris Spassky

It's not that difficult to play well and win titles in a team like Barcelona, but it's in the national side where you see a player's true class. That was the case with figures like Pele, Diego Maradona and Zinedine Zidane. With Spain, Iniesta has shown that he is among the best players of all time and that's why I rate him higher than Messi or Ronaldo. Even though the latter two have incredible scoring records for their clubs, they still haven't won anything with Argentina or Portugal respectively. ~ Boris Becker

Food always sounds optimistic when you have it and pessimistic when you don't. ~ Boris Zubry

Russia also declared its independence. This was approved by the Supreme Soviet, and you know and remember that there was the Declaration on the Independence of Russia. ~ Boris Yeltsin

I am caught like a beast at bay. Somewhere are people, freedom, light, But all I hear is the baying of the pack, There is no way out for me. ~ Boris Pasternak

The greatness of a writer has nothing to do with subject matter itself, only with how much the subject matter touches the author. ~ Boris Pasternak

That little guy, said Boris in the car on the way to Antwerp. You know the painter saw him-he wasn't painting that bird from his mind, you know? That's a real little guy, chained up on the wall, there. If I saw him mixed up with dozen other birds all the same kind, I could pick him out, no problem.
And he's right. So could I. And if I could go back in time I'd clip the chain in a heartbeat and never care a minute that the picture was never painted. ~ Donna Tartt

The wind swept the snow aside, ever faster and thicker, as if it were trying to catch up with something, and Yurii Andreievich stared ahead of him out of the window, as if he were not looking at the snow but were still reading Tonia's letter and as if what flickered past him were not small dry snow crystals but the spaces between the small black letters, white, white, endless, endless. ~ Boris Pasternak

That's right. Five minutes into the all-hands meeting, the fundamental values of this totalitarian society had received the support of the vast majority of the crew. So, let me tell you, when humans are lost in space, it takes only five minutes to reach totalitarianism. Boris ~ Liu Cixin

After I won the title, I was confronted with the real world. People do not behave naturally anymore - hypocrisy is everywhere. ~ Boris Spassky

London is - after Athens and Rome - the third most influential city in history. ~ Boris Johnson

I don't want ever to be champion again. ~ Boris Spassky

Craziness is only the state of mind. ~ Boris Zubry

My ideal world is, we're there, we're in the EU, trying to make it better. ~ Boris Johnson

When Cameron's Conservatives come to power it will be a golden age for cyclists and an Elysium of cycle lanes, bike racks, and sharia law for bike thieves. And I hope that cycling in London will become almost Chinese in its ubiquity. ~ Boris Johnson

One ends up relying on pure musical inspiration, and failing that, the music won't lead to anything good, or it will alienate all but the most die-hard fans. ~ Boris Vian

I have as much chance of becoming Prime Minister as of being decapitated by a frisbee or of finding Elvis. ~ Boris Johnson

Only the familiar transformed by genius is truly great. ~ Boris Pasternak

I'm a one-nation Tory. ~ Boris Johnson

I didn't start a war. Nobody died. ~ Boris Becker

She can't go into public care," he explained. "She'd pine away. The poor simpleton is far too used to me." That was when Fandorin really astounded him. "I envy you," he said, sighing. "You're a fortunate man, Tulipov. At such a young age you already have reason to respect yourself - something you can be proud of. The Lord has given you a firm center for the whole of your life. ~ Boris Akunin

I don't know a movement more self-centered and further removed from the facts than Marxism. Everyone is worried only about proving himself in practical matters, and as for the men in power, they are so anxious to establish the myth of their infallibility that they do their utmost to ignore the truth. Politics don't appeal to me. I don't like people who don't care about the truth. ~ Boris Pasternak

I lead a life of blameless domesticity and always have done. ~ Boris Johnson

Lear's daughters and their loathsome husbands are all deservedly slaughtered for their ill treatment of an aged ruler (one of the reasons that tragedy remains so huge in Asia) ~ Boris Johnson

You have no right to criticise Russia over Chechnya. ~ Boris Yeltsin

Would Boris like a naughty Natasha in his bed? ~ Willow Madison

Volunteering is also now more crucial than ever in helping people find work. ~ Boris Johnson

Life isn't like coursework, baby. It's one damn essay crisis after another. ~ Boris Johnson

The three great moments of my life had to be the concerts of Ellington in 1938, Dizzy in '48, and Ella in '52. ~ Boris Vian

Cybele, or the Great Mother - Magna Mater. This Cybele was supposed to have conceived a passion for a young man named Atys, and when Atys failed to respond to her advances, she became jealous. When she caught him having it off with someone else, she drove him so mad that he castrated himself. I am afraid that respectable young Londoners had celebrated their devotion to Magna Mater by doing the same - and we know this for sure because the river near London Bridge has also yielded a fearful set of serrated forceps, adorned with the heads of Eastern divinities. ~ Boris Johnson

There is an African fly that lays its eggs in the jelly of children's eyes, the hatching larvae blinding them by feeding on the eye itself. But the fly has no quarrel with the child. It is merely following its nature.
Likewise, Boris Johnson, a vile grub laying his horrible eggs in the soft jelly of the EU debate, has no agenda beyond his own advancement. He believes in nothing, and neither does his spiritual soulmate, the eye-scoffing African fly. ~ Stewart Lee

I love swimming in rivers, and well remember once jumping in at Chiswick. ~ Boris Johnson

How many things in the world deserve our loyalty? Very few indeed. I think one should be loyal to immortality, which is another word for life, a stronger word for it. ~ Boris Pasternak

No one was dead, but her son would not call just to call. She'd had to enter intimate terms with this new understanding in her life, like an illness. ~ Boris Fishman

The monster was the best friend I ever had. ~ Boris Karloff

I have not been more robust towards female rather than male assembly members and I do not believe I have been remotely sexist. ~ Boris Johnson

There are many ways in which people are made aware of their power to believe in the supremacy of Divine guidance and power: through music or visual art, some event or experience decisively influencing their life, looking through a microscope or telescope, or just by looking at the miraculous manifestations or purposefulness of Nature. ~ Ernst Boris Chain

I am supporting David Cameron purely out of cynical self-interest. ~ Boris Johnson

The most important thing is that Milosevic agreed to sit at the negotiating table with the Kosovo Albanians. ~ Boris Yeltsin

The average introduction to almost any book is somewhat of a bore ~ Boris Karloff

Is that what you want? To have your own place?"
"Isn't it what you want?" Hans asked, his resolve weakening.
Thomas pulled him into an embrace. "Don't be dumb. This is your home now. We agreed you'd move back into your room while the relatives were here, but as soon as they're gone, Boris and I want you back in our bed."
Hans sank gratefully against his broad chest, and a moment later, Boris pressed up against his back, making a Hans sandwich. He sighed contentedly.
"Did we not settle all this?" Boris asked "We love you. We are a family."
"I know that," Hans said, "but a lot of boyfriends live apart."
Thomas squeezed him tight. "Not us." He eased up, so Hans could breathe again. "We have plenty of room for you here. We want you to live with us."
"Do you want that too, puppy?" Boris asked, nuzzling his nape.
Hans sighed. All of this rubbing together of bodies was causing his cock to swell. "Yes," he said.
Then they made love ~ Jamie Fessenden

I'm made up of immigrant stock. I went to a primary school in London. I grew up eating Spangles, why shouldn't I be as well placed to speak for Londoners as anyone else? ~ Boris Johnson

We're very open and outspoken about our faith and our beliefs. We also talk about our doubts, our moments of insecurities. We talk about it all day, how we're inspired by God. We recognize little miracles every day, and that's how we're raising our daughter. ~ Boris Kodjoe

In Vienna, when I was a year-and-a-half or two years-old. I remember it because I remember the little blue raincoat I used to wear, and how the buttons felt. I liked to walk on the street in front of our house when it was raining, and jump into all the puddles. That's weird, but that's my earliest memory. ~ Boris Kodjoe

I think that the World Champion should try to defend the quality of play more than anyone else. ~ Boris Spassky

Someday when we get around to writing a genealogy of our failures, inadequacies, and disappointments, an important place in such a study will be the books we never read, for whatever reason. Aside from the music we never listened to, the movies we never watched, or the old archives and maps we never explored, the books we never read will be one of the indicators of our anachronisms and our flawed humanity. ~ Boris Gunjevic

Back in America, true to her nature if not to Boris, Martha met and promptly fell in love with a new man, ~ Erik Larson

With you I'm jealous of what is obscure, unconscious, of something in which explanations are unthinkable, of something that cannot be puzzled out. I'm jealous of your toilet things, of the drops of sweat on your skin, of the infectious diseases borne on the air, which may affect you and poison your blood. ~ Boris Pasternak

I learned to baby the rabbit in sour cream, tenderer than chicken and less forgiving of distraction, as well as the banosh the way the Italians did polenta. You had to mix in the cornmeal little by little while the dairy simmered - Oksana boiled the cornmeal in milk and sour cream, never water or stock - as it clumped otherwise, which I learned the hard way. I learned to curdle and heat milk until it became a bladder of farmer cheese dripping out its whey through a cheesecloth tied over the knob of a cabinet door; how to use the whey to make a more protein-rich bread; how to sear pucks of farmer cheese spiked with raisins and vanilla until you had breakfast. I learned patience for the pumpkin preserves - stir gently to avoid turning the cubes into puree, let cool for the runoff to thicken, repeat for two days. How to pleat dumplings and fry cauliflower florets so that half the batter did not remain stuck to the pan. To marinate the peppers Oksana made for my grandfather on their first day together. To pickle watermelon, brine tomatoes, and even make potato latkes the way my grandmother made them. ~ Boris Fishman

While maintaining our nuclear potential at the proper level, we need to devote more attention to developing the entire range of means of information warfare. ~ Boris Yeltsin

Thousands of mercenaries, who have trained in camps on the territory of Chechnya as well as come in from abroad, are actually preparing to impose extremist ideas on the whole world. ~ Boris Yeltsin

God forbid I should bleed to death, eh? Then you'd have to cart around my rotting corpse. (Kyrian)
Could you be any more morbid? Jeez, who was your idol growing up? Boris Karloff? (Amanda)
Hannibal, actually. (Kyrian)
You're trying to scare me, aren't you? Well, it won't work. I grew up in a house with an angry poltergeist and two sisters who used to conjure demons just to fight them. Buster, I've seen it all and your gallows humor isn't working on me. (Amanda) ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

A conscious attempt to fall asleep is sure to produce insomnia, to try to be conscious of one's own digestion is a sure way to upset the stomach. Consciousness is a poison when we apply it to ourselves. Consciousness is a light directed outward. It's like the headlights on a locomotive - turn them inward and you'd have a crash. ~ Boris Pasternak

My speaking style was criticised by no less an authority than Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was a low moment, my friends, to have my rhetorical skills denounced by a monosyllabic Austrian cyborg. ~ Boris Johnson