Madonna In A Fur Coat Quotes

It is, perhaps, easier to dismiss a man whose face gives no indication of an inner life. And what a pity that is: a dash of curiosity is all it takes to stumble upon treasures we never expected. That

For me, love is something else entirely. It’s beyond all logic and impossible to describe or define. It’s one thing to like someone. To be consumed, body and soul, by desire is quite another. That’s what love is to me — desire that’s all-consuming. Desire that’s impossible to resist!

nothing in this world can ever match the marvels that we conjure up in our own minds.

Everywhere I went, I would be looking for her. In every pair of eyes I would be searching for the Madonna in a fur coat. I knew from the outset that I would never find her. Yet it was not in my power to give up searching. She had condemned me to a lifelong quest for a cipher for someone that did not exist. She should never have done this to me

Everyone had an idea as to how to save Germany. However, none of these proposals had anything to do with Germany. Rather, they were tied to personal interests. An

I shall hide it all away, in a place no one will ever find. Everything, everything. But especially my soul.

I were to spend the rest of my life in supplication, seeking forgiveness for having murdered her memory. For the greatest betrayal, the greatest sin we can commit against the blameless is to abandon a loving heart.

The essence of life is in solitude – wouldn’t you agree? All unions are built on falsehood. People can only get to know each other up to a point and then they make up the rest, until one day, seeing their mistake, they turn their backs on sadness and run away. Would this ever happen, if they stopped believing in their dreams and made do with what was possible? If everyone accepted what was natural, then no one would suffer disappointment, no one would curse fate.

How easily people can read each other!…And there I was, trying so hard to penetrate someone else’s mind, to find out if the soul hiding inside it was ordered or in turmoil. For even the most wretched and simpleminded man could be a surprise, even a fool could have a soul whose torments were a constant source of amazement. Why are we so slow to see this, and why do we assume that it is the easiest thing in the world to know and judge another? Why, when we are reluctant even to describe a wedge of cheese we are seeing for the first time, do we draw our final conclusions from our first encounters with people, and happily dismiss them?

I’m feeling a little better today!” “Of course you are. It was never going to go on like this forever…

yet to learn that nothing in this world can ever match the marvels that we conjure up in our own minds.

For a time, many years ago, I was interested in art,” he said. “Every once in a while, I sketch something, just to keep my hand in…silly little things, as you can see…just to kill time…

Having never known such intimacy before, I was desperate to protect it. And perhaps what I desired most was to possess her wholly and absolutely, body and soul, but I was so fearful of losing what I already had that I did not dare look away from it. I was, in effect, watching the most beautiful bird in all creation and keeping perfectly still for fear of frightening it away with a sudden movement.

I took her hands in mine and kissed them. Most probably tears were welling up in my eyes. For a moment she came closer, almost close enough to embrace. Seeing the warm glow in her eyes, I thought my heart might stop. Haven was only centimetres away.

The essence of life is solitude - wouldn't you agree? All unions are built on falsehood. People can only get to know each other up to a point and then they make up the rest, until one day, seeing their mistake, they turn their backs on sadness and run away.

Still, our conversations remained superficial. But this no longer puzzled me. For wasn’t there sufficient pleasure to be had in silent patience — in viewing others’ vices with compassion and enjoying their vulgarities? When we walked side by side, did I not feel his humanity most profoundly? Only now did I begin to understand why it was not always through words that people sought each other out and came to understand each other, and why some poets went to such lengths to seek out companions who could, like them, contemplate the beauties of nature in silence.

all the men that I have ever known have ended up leaving in sorrow or anger once they realize I don’t love them, and can never love them … But why, when they say goodbye, do they assume I am the one to blame? Because I never gave them what I promised I never would, or because they convinced themselves it would be otherwise? Isn’t that unfair?

In the beginning it was curiosity that kept us talking. We were always looking for new things in each other. Over time, curiosity gave way to habit. If, for whatever reason, we couldn’t see each other for a few days, we’d begin to miss each other. When at last we met, we would walk down the streets hand in hand, as happy as children who’d been kept apart too long. How I loved her! I had opened my heart to the world I saw in her.

I thought of neither the future or the past; I lived only in the present."- Madonna in A Fur Coat

I couldn’t make friends with boys either. They’d look for a soft centre and when they saw it wasn’t there, when they saw I was a match for them, they’d run away. That’s how I understand only too well where men get their strength and ambition; there is no other creature on this earth that races after such easy success, and no other creature as proud, arrogant and egotistical, yet at the same time cowardly and set in his ways.

Nature’s logic holds a higher place in my estimation than anything else. So let’s forget all this and just allow our friendship to take its natural course. Let’s not try to set it on the false path or tie it up with decisions made in advance.

rushed back to the pension. I needed time to think, to reflect on all that had passed. My precious memories of the night just gone were in need of a sanctuary, far from the noise of everyday recollection. In the same way that I had, only moments earlier, not dared say a word, lest it tear my sublime joy asunder, I now feared that the rough-and-tumble of my imagination would destroy the harmony I still felt inside me.

Earlier in the day I’d stored up so many things to tell her. But now I couldn’t remember a single one. My mind was spinning with new thoughts. Finally, I just started talking. In no particular order, I told her about my childhood and my years of military service, and the books I had read and the dreams I had held dear. I told her about Fahriye, the girl next door, and all the bandits I’d met after the war. I shared with her things I had until now shared with no one, or even admitted to myself. I was unburdening my very soul. This being the first time I had ever tried to explain myself, I wanted to be utterly candid, hiding nothing. But in my zeal to tell the whole truth, I put too much emphasis on my shortcomings, thereby distorting it.

After being together, and giving each other an equal amount of pleasure, they’d sidle up to me, sighing idiotically, and either apologize or offer to protect me, making it clear that in their eyes, they had vanquished me…But they were in fact the ones who had exposed just how pitiful and miserable they really were. There is no woman as pitiful and ridiculous as a man swept away by his passions. At the same time they take huge pride in them, seeing them as proof of their virility. My God, it’s enough to drive a person crazy…Although I know that there is in me no tendency toward the unnatural, I would rather fall in love with a woman.

How can I put it…the aesthetics would be all wrong…and then, I am a lover of the natural world…I have always been reluctant to behave in a way that goes against the natural world…This is why I believe that I definitely need to love a man…but a real man…a man who could sweep me off my feet without resorting to brute strength…without asking anything of me, without controlling me, or degrading me, a man who could love me and walk by my side…In other words, a truly powerful man, a real man…Now do you see why I can’t love you?

Did you know that Berlin has only a hundred days of sun a year, and the remaining two hundred and sixty-five days are overcast? Can hothouses and artificial lighting ever be enough for leaves accustomed to so much heat and light? Somehow they survive, they manage not to wither away…But can we call this life? To take a living plant from its natural environment and keep it in such awful confinement, just so a few enthusiasts can enjoy them — isn’t that a kind of torture?

While we agreed on a great deal, there were things about which we disagreed, and where we could agree to disagree in deference to a larger goal. We were not afraid to reveal to each other the most secret corners of our souls and then quarrel. All the same, there were areas we left untouched, if only because we had no idea what they were. But I sensed their importance.

For how could a man so intimately acquainted with his surroundings, and so clear and sharp in his observations of others, ever know anger or excitement? What choice did a man like this have, in the face of small-minded attacks, but to stand firm like a rock? Our longings, our disappointments, our fits of rage — we succumb to them when something unexpected happens to us, something that seems to make no sense. Is it even possible to shock a man who is ready for anything and who knows exactly what to expect from anyone? Even

Here, too, the furnishings were fine, even expensive. Red velvet armchairs, low walnut side tables and, leaning against the far wall, an enormous radio. Fine cream-colored lacework adorned every table and the back of every chair. Hanging from a wall was a plaque in the shape of a ship, on which was written a prayer.

Later, when I’d been coming and going for some time, I got to know these children better. And they weren’t bad people at all. Rather, they had nothing, absolutely nothing, inside. All their impertinences came from that. It was the yawning void inside them that drove them to deride, scorn, and ridicule others, for this was their only source of satisfaction, their only way of knowing who they were.

imprudence?

dejected.

disquieting.

My daydreams were in sharp contrast to real life; they were full of adventures and heroic deeds.

So this is Europe,” I said to myself. “Why all the fuss?” From here it was a short road to the conclusion that the world itself was a place of little interest.

vapid

languorous

There is no other creature on this earth that races after such easy success, and no other creature as proud, arrogant, and egotistical yet at the same time cowardly and set in his ways.

The more I dwelt on my absurd anxieties and needless, groundless apprehensions, the more I castigated myself for letting my paranoia and wretched intuition darken what should have been the brightest days of my life, and the more I despaired.

The more I needed my friends, the more I longed to run away.

He was, I thought, too timid ever to dare to explore his soul, let alone express it.

How absurd they were, the games we played in the name of friendship;

The closer I got to him, the more puzzles he threw in my path.

I understand only too well where men get their strength and ambition; there is no other creature on this earth that races after such easy success, and no other creature as proud, arrogant and egotistical, yet at the same time cowardly and set in his ways.

why do we assume that it is the easiest thing in the world to know and judge another? Why, when we are reluctant even to describe a wedge of cheese we are seeing for the first time, do we draw our final conclusions from our first encounters with people, and happily dismiss them?

He was, in the end, the sort of man who causes us to ask ourselves, “What does he live for? What does he find in life? What logic compels him to keep breathing? What philosophy drives him as he wanders the earth?” But we ask in vain if we fail to look beyond the surface—if we forget that beneath each surface lurks another realm, in which a caged mind whirls alone. It is, perhaps, easier to dismiss a man whose face gives no indication of an inner life. And what a pity that is: a dash of curiosity is all it takes to stumble upon treasures we never expected.

but my beautiful thoughts had deserted me. The more I searched for them, the more my mind emptied out, until it was nothing more than a throbbing, piteous piece of meat.

No doubt I was the most useless man in the world. The world would be no worse off without me. I expected nothing of anyone and no one expected anything of me.

A certa altura Maria perguntou: “Aonde vamos?”. “Não sei!” “Não está curioso?” “Eu estou com você... aonde você quiser me levar, eu vou!

Nessa mesma noite, Raif Efêndi abandonou sua vida e entrou na minha.

O quarto estava imerso num silêncio assustador. Parecia que estávamos aguardando com toda a tensão da nossa alma. Havia muita coisa acumulada dentro de nós. Eu podia sentir isso quase de forma palpável.

Ter que reprimir todas essas lembranças dentro de mim acaso não equivale a ser enterrado vivo?

De que servem todos os vínculos se as almas não estão ligadas?

Eu a amava tanto. Sentia tanto afeto dentro de mim… afeto suficiente para amar o mundo.

No íntimo podia ouvir uma voz débil me avisando: depois de ver alguém como realmente é, seja quem for, e aceitar a realidade nua e crua, a intimidade não é mais viável. Mas eu não queria ver a realidade nua e crua. Sabia que não aguentaria nenhuma realidade que me afastasse dela.

The books I was now reading spoke of people like me, of the world I saw and heard around me. They spoke of things I had witnessed but not really grasped. Now their true meanings began to emerge.

I love you... not madly, but I love you with a clear mind.

But our missed opportunities never leave us, and every time they come back to haunt us, we ache. Or perhaps what haunts us is that nagging thought that things might have turned out differently. Because without that thought, we would put it down to fate and accept it.

Sie sind also nicht eifersüchtig auf mich? Liebst du mich wirklich so sehr?

When misfortune visits those who once walked alongside us, we do tend to feel relief, almost as if we believe we have ourselves been spared, and as we come to convince ourselves that they are suffering in our stead, we feel for these wretched creatures.

We almost never ran out of things to say to one another after that first night. If we talked about the people and vistas we saw along the way, it was because they offered us a chance to expand on our ideas and determine what we had in common. This intimacy came from thinking alike; in truth, it came from accepting one side of an idea while preparing to pay the price demanded by the other. But isn’t this how souls come together, by holding another’s every idea to be true and making it their own?

But most would come into this world and leave it without even knowing what they had missed. A soul only came forward when it found its twin, when it felt no need to rely on mere words to explain itself.

For as happy as I was that we thought so similarly, and were already so close, I was afraid – that one day she would leave me or hide the truth from me. That we would never, whatever the cost, agree to live a lie. And from somewhere deep inside, I could hear a faint voice warning me: once you have seen someone as she truly is – once you have accepted reality stripped bare – it doesn’t matter who she is: intimacy is no longer possible.