Philippe Claudel Quotes

Saintliness is very odd. When people encounter it, they often take it for something else, something completely unlike it: indifference, mockery, scheming, coldness, insolence, perhaps even contempt. But they're mistaken, and that makes them furious. They commit an awful crime. This is doubtless the reason why most saints end up as martyrs.

Oh little Poupchette, some may tell you that you are nobody's child, a child of defilement, a child begotten in fear and horror. Some may tell you that you are a child of abomination conceived in abomination, a tainted child, a child polluted long before you were born. Do not pay attention to them, my little sweetheart, please do not listen to them; listen to me. I say you are my child and I love you. I sometimes say that out of horror, beauty and purity and grace are born. I say I am your father for ever. I say the loveliest rose can bloom in contaminated soil. I say you are the dawn, the light of all my tomorrows, and the only thing that matters is the promise you represent. I say you are my luck and my forgiveness. My darling Poupchette, I say you are my whole life.

It's always been difficult for me to speak and express my innermost thoughts. I prefer to write. When I sit down and write, words grow very docile, they come and feed out of my hand like little birds, and I can do almost what I want with them; whereas when I try to marshal them in open air, they fly away from me.

Την επομένη δεν κουνήθηκα, όλη μέρα αναμασούσα τις σκέψεις μου. Σκεφτόμουν την Ιστορία, με κεφαλαία, και τη δική μου ιστορία, τη δική μας. Αυτοί που γράφουν την πρώτη γνωρίζουν τη δεύτερη; Πώς η μνήμη κάποιων συγκρατεί αυτό που άλλοι έχουν ξεχάσει ή δεν το είδαν ποτέ; Ποιος έχει δίκιο, αυτός που είναι αποφασισμένος να μην εγκαταλείψει στο σκοτάδι το παρελθόν ή αυτός που πετάει στη λήθη ό,τι δεν τον βολεύει; Μήπως, για να ζήσεις, για να συνεχίσεις να ζεις, ίσως πρέπει ν’ αποφασίσεις ότι η πραγματικότητα δεν είναι απολύτως αληθινή ή μήπως πρέπει να επιλέξεις μιαν άλλη πραγματικότητα όταν αυτή που έχεις βιώσει σου είναι δυσβάσταχτη; Άλλωστε αυτό δεν έκανα στο στρατόπεδο; Δεν επέλεξα να ζήσω με την ανάμνηση και την προσδοκία της Εμέλια, πετώντας την καθημερινότητά μου στην εξωπραγματικότητα του εφιάλτη; Μήπως η Ιστορία είναι η μέγιστη αλήθεια υφασμένη από εκατομμύρια ξεχωριστά ψέματα, όπως οι παλιές κουβέρτες που έφτιαχνε η Φεντορίν για να μας θρέψει όταν ήμουν παιδί και φαίνονταν καινούριες και πανέμορφες μέσα στο ουράνιο τόξο των χρωμάτων τους, ενώ αποτελούνταν από κουρέλια, ανομοιογενή σχήματα, μαλλιά αμφίβολης ποιότητας κι άγνωστης προέλευσης;

...In the end, there's no sort of difference between dying from ignorance and dying under the feet of thousands of men who have regained their freedom. You close your eyes, and then there's nothing anymore. And death is never difficult. It requires neither a hero nor a slave. It eats what it's served.

Why did I, like thousands of others, have to carry a cross I hadn't chosen, a cross which was not made for my shoulders and which didn't concern me? Who decided to come rummaging around in my obscure existence, invade my gray anonymity, my meager tranquility, and bowl me like a little ball in a great game of skittles? God? Well, in that case, if He exists, if He really exists, let Him hide His face. Let Him put His two hands on His head, and let Him bow down. It may be, as Peiper used to teach us, that many men are unworthy of Him, but now I know that He, too, is unworthy of most of us, and that if the creature is capable of producing horror, it's solely because his Creator has slipped him the recipe for it.