All my life I blew into a telescope and was surprised that there was no music. And then he looked carefully at the trombone and was surprised that he couldn’t see a damn thing. “30 best quotes from Sergei Dovlatov... Madness becomes the norm; the norm causes a feeling of miracle
Sergey Dovlatov- one of the most read Russian-speaking writers of the late twentieth century. But while living in his homeland, he was unable to reach the reader with his works: they saw the light only after his emigration to the USA and began to be published in Russia only in the second half of the 80s, when they gained enormous popularity.
In his stories, absurdity acts as the basis of order in human destiny. His heroes, ordinary, seemingly unremarkable people, turn out to be bright and unique, precisely because of their carelessness and bad luck.
Dovlatov does not teach anyone anything and does not judge anyone. He does not have “positive” and “negative” heroes, it all depends on the point of view. Because this is the main truth of life. Dovlatov’s humorous and at the same time sad prose became a classic and, like any classic, went to the people in the form of proverbs and sayings:
- There is one painful moment in a conversation with a woman. You present facts, reasons, arguments. You appeal to logic and common sense. And suddenly you discover that she is disgusted by the very sound of your voice.
- Love, friendship, and respect are not connected as much as by a common hatred of something.
- A decent person is one who does nasty things without pleasure.
- Most people consider unsolvable those problems whose solution is of little satisfaction to them.
- People around them love not honest people, but kind ones. Not brave, but sensitive. Not principled, but condescending. In other words, unprincipled.
- Man is accustomed to asking himself: who am I? There is a scientist, an American, a driver, a Jew, an immigrant... But you should always ask yourself: am I shit?
- It's not money that attracts women. Not cars or jewelry. Not restaurants and expensive clothes. Not power, wealth and elegance. And what made a person powerful, rich and elegant. A power that some are endowed with and others are completely deprived of.
- All my life I've been blowing telescope and was surprised that there was no music. And then he looked carefully at the trombone and was surprised that he couldn’t see a damn thing.
- We endlessly scold Comrade Stalin, and, of course, for good reason. And yet I want to ask - who wrote four million denunciations?
- The only honest road is the path of mistakes, disappointments and hopes.
- Nothing else, but loneliness is enough. Money, let’s say, I run out quickly, loneliness never...
- It's crazy to live with a man who doesn't leave just because he's lazy...
- I walked and thought - the world is gripped by madness. Madness becomes the norm. The norm evokes a sense of miracle.
- Do you know what is important in life? The main thing is that there is only one life. A minute passed and it was over. There won't be another...
- The more hopeless the goal, the deeper the emotions.
- Love is for young people. For military personnel and athletes... But here everything is much more complicated. This is no longer love, but fate.
- The editor was a good-natured man. Of course, until the minute he became cruel and evil.
- I only light up when I'm drinking. And I drink constantly. Therefore, many people mistakenly think that I smoke.
- I felt disgusted and left. Or rather, he stayed.
- Don't ask God for more.
- I counted the money without taking my hand out of my pocket.
- There is no greater tragedy for a man than a complete lack of character!
- I prefer to be alone, but next to someone...
- It’s been a long time since I’ve stopped dividing people into positive and negative. And even more so for literary heroes. In addition, I am not sure that in life a crime is inevitably followed by repentance, and a feat is followed by bliss. We are what we feel like.
- I think love has no dimensions at all. There is only yes or no.
- A person can give anything to a person... Depending on the circumstances.
- It’s normal to go visit when called. It’s terrible to go on a visit when you don’t invite me. However, the best thing is when they call you and you don’t go.
- Family is if you guess by the sound who is washing in the shower.
- "Life is Beautiful and amazing!" - as Comrade Mayakovsky exclaimed on the eve of suicide.
- I won't change the linoleum. I changed my mind because the world is doomed.
“Envious people believe that women are attracted to rich men by their money. Or what you can buy with this money. I used to think so, but then I became convinced that it was a lie. It's not money that attracts women. Not cars or jewelry. Not restaurants and expensive clothes. Not power, wealth and elegance. And what made a person powerful, rich and elegant. A power that some are endowed with and others are completely deprived of.”
Sergei Dovlatov is one of the most famous and widely read Russian-speaking writers of the late twentieth century. His books have been translated into great amount languages. Many of his novels and short stories have been filmed.
Dovlatov’s incredibly humorous and at the same time sad prose became a classic and, like almost any classic, went to the people in the form of proverbs and sayings. During a large period of his life, while in exile, he published about twelve books.
There are no righteous people in Sergei Donatovich’s books, because there are no villains in them either. His idea is simple and noble: to tell how strange people live - sometimes laughing sadly, sometimes laughing funny. Sergei knows that both heaven and hell are located within ourselves.
A selection of the best quotes and statements by Sergei Dovlatov about man, life and love:
1. A decent person is one who does nasty things without pleasure.
2. Most people consider unsolvable those problems whose solution is of little satisfaction to them.
3. A person is used to asking himself: who am I? There is a scientist, an American, a driver, a Jew, an immigrant... But you should always ask yourself: am I shit?
4. The introduction was delayed. We must sleep together or break up.
5. When a person is abandoned alone and at the same time called the most beloved, it becomes sickening.
6. All my life I blew into a telescope and was surprised that there was no music. And then he looked carefully at the trombone and was surprised that he couldn’t see a damn thing.
7. We endlessly scold Comrade Stalin, and, of course, for good reason. And yet I want to ask - who wrote four million denunciations?
8. The only honest road is the path of mistakes, disappointments and hopes.
9. Nothing else, but loneliness is enough. Money, let’s say, I run out quickly, loneliness never...
10. It’s crazy to live with a man who doesn’t leave just because he’s lazy...
11. I walked and thought - the world is gripped by madness. Madness becomes the norm. The norm evokes a sense of miracle.
12. Do you know what is important in life? The main thing is that there is only one life. A minute passed and it was over. There won't be another...
13. The more hopeless the goal, the deeper the emotions.
14. Love is for young people. For military personnel and athletes... But here everything is much more complicated. This is no longer love, but fate.
16. “The main thing in a book and in a woman is not the form, but the content...” Even now, after countless disappointments in life, this attitude seems a bit boring to me. And I still only like beautiful women.
17. I prefer to be alone, but next to someone...
18. For a long time now I have stopped dividing people into positive and negative. And even more so for literary heroes. In addition, I am not sure that in life a crime is inevitably followed by repentance, and a feat is followed by bliss. We are what we feel like.
19. For a whole year, something like intellectual intimacy took place between us. With a hint of hostility and debauchery.
20. My life is quite tolerable now, I don’t do a damn thing, I read and get fat. But sometimes you feel so bad at heart that you want to punch yourself in the face.
21. I think love has no dimensions at all. There is only yes or no.
22. A person can give anything to a person... Depending on the circumstances.
23. It’s normal to go for a visit when called. It’s terrible to go on a visit when you don’t invite me. However, the best thing is when they call you and you don’t go.
24. Family is if you can guess by the sound who is washing in the shower.
25. “Life is beautiful and amazing! “- as Comrade Mayakovsky exclaimed on the eve of suicide.
26. I will not change the linoleum. I changed my mind, because the world is doomed.
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Sergei Dovlatov's artistic idea is simple and noble: to tell how strange people live - sometimes laughing sadly, sometimes laughing funny. There are no righteous people in his books, because there are no villains in them either. The writer knows: both heaven and hell are within ourselves.
website I have collected for you the best statements by Sergei Donatovich about life, man and love.
- Man is accustomed to asking himself: who am I? There is a scientist, an American, a driver, a Jew, an immigrant... But you should always ask yourself: am I shit?
- Most people consider unsolvable those problems whose solution is of little satisfaction to them.
- The only honest road is the path of mistakes, disappointments and hopes.
- A decent person is one who does nasty things without pleasure.
- You claim that means there was no love. There was love. Love has gone ahead, and you have fallen behind.
- When a person is abandoned alone and at the same time called the most beloved, it becomes sickening.
- All my life I blew into a telescope and was surprised that there was no music. And then he looked carefully at the trombone and was surprised that he couldn’t see a damn thing.
- Nothing else, but loneliness is enough. Let’s say I run out of money quickly, loneliness never...
- It's crazy to live with a man who doesn't leave just because he's lazy...
- Do you know what is important in life? The main thing is that there is only one life. A minute passed and it was over. There won't be another...
- Love, friendship, and respect are not connected as much as by a common hatred of something.
- I walked and thought - the world is gripped by madness. Madness becomes the norm. The norm evokes a sense of miracle.
- We endlessly scold Comrade Stalin, and, of course, for good reason. And yet I want to ask - who wrote four million denunciations?
- The best way to overcome innate insecurities is to be as confident as possible.
- The more hopeless the goal, the deeper the emotions.
- I think love has no dimensions at all. There is only yes or no.
- Love is for young people. For military personnel and athletes... But here everything is much more complicated. This is no longer love, but fate.
- “The main thing in a book and in a woman is not the form, but the content.” Even now, after countless disappointments in life, this attitude seems a little boring to me. And I still only like beautiful women.
- For a whole year there was something like an intellectual intimacy between us. With a hint of hostility and debauchery.
- I prefer to be alone, but next to someone...
- My life is quite tolerable now, I don’t do a damn thing, I read and get fat. But sometimes you feel so bad at heart that you want to punch yourself in the face.
- A person can do anything to a person... Depending on the circumstances.
- It’s normal to go visit when called. It’s terrible to go on a visit when you don’t invite me. However, the best thing is when they call you and you don’t go.
- I won't change the linoleum. I changed my mind, because the world is doomed.
- "Life is Beautiful and amazing!" - as Comrade Mayakovsky exclaimed on the eve of suicide.
- I only light up when I'm drinking. And I drink constantly. Therefore, many people mistakenly think that I smoke.
- They don’t ask God for more.
- I counted the money without taking my hand out of my pocket.
- It’s been a long time since I’ve stopped dividing people into positive and negative. And even more so for literary heroes. In addition, I am not sure that in life a crime is inevitably followed by repentance, and a feat is followed by bliss. We are what we feel like.
- Family is if you guess by the sound who is washing in the shower.
1. I think love has no dimensions at all. There is only yes or no.
2. A person is accustomed to asking himself: who am I? There is a scientist, an American, a driver, a Jew, an immigrant... But you should always ask yourself: am I shit?
Joseph Brodsky and Sergei Dovlatov
3. Do you know what is important in life? The main thing is that there is only one life. A minute passed and it was over. There won't be another...
4. Hell is ourselves.
5. My wife is sure that marital responsibilities are first and foremost sobriety.
6. Family - if you can guess by the sound who is washing in the shower.
7. I only light up when I'm drinking. And I drink constantly. Therefore, many people mistakenly think that I smoke.
8. “Life is beautiful and amazing!” - as Comrade Mayakovsky exclaimed on the eve of suicide.
9. The family is not a unit of the state. The family is the state. The struggle for power, economic, creative, cultural problems. Exploitation, dreams of freedom, revolutionary sentiments. Etc. All this is family.
10. Borya’s wife, whose maiden name was Faintzimmer, loved to repeat: “Borya drank so much of my blood that now he is half Jewish!”
11. There is one painful moment in a conversation with a woman. You present facts, reasons, arguments. You appeal to logic and common sense. And suddenly you discover that she is disgusted by the very sound of your voice.
12. I read so much about the dangers of alcohol! I decided to quit reading forever.
13. Talent is like lust. It's hard to hide. Even more difficult is to simulate.
14. Most people consider unsolvable those problems whose solution is of little satisfaction to them.
15. Love, friendship, and respect are not connected as much as by a common hatred of something.
16. It’s not money that attracts women. Not cars or jewelry. Not restaurants and expensive clothes. Not power, wealth and elegance. And what made a person powerful, rich and elegant. A power that some are endowed with and others are completely deprived of.
17. Relationships with women are always difficult for a good man. And I'm a good person. I declare without a shadow of embarrassment, because there is nothing to be proud of here. A good person is expected to behave accordingly. They are charging him high requirements. He carries on himself the daily painful burden of nobility, intelligence, diligence, conscience, and humor. And then he is abandoned for some notorious scumbag. And this bastard is told, laughing, about the boring virtues of a good man. Women only love scoundrels, everyone knows that. However, not everyone can be a scoundrel. I had a friend, a currency trader named Shark. He beat his wife with the handle of a shovel. Gave her shampoo to my beloved. Killed the cat. Once in my life I made her a sandwich with cheese. The wife cried all night with emotion and tenderness. I sent canned food to Mordovia for nine years. I was waiting... A good man, who needs it, you ask?..
18. People around them love not honest people, but kind ones. Not brave, but sensitive. Not principled, but condescending. In other words, unprincipled.
19. A decent person is one who does nasty things without pleasure.
20. We endlessly scold Comrade Stalin, and, of course, for good reason. And yet I want to ask - who wrote four million denunciations?
21. “The main thing in a book and in a woman is not the form, but the content.” Even now, after countless disappointments in life, this attitude seems a little boring to me. And I still only like beautiful women.
- What did you steal, I wonder?
Zek waved it off embarrassedly:
- Nothing special... Tractor...
— One-piece tractor?!
- Well.
- And how did you kidnap him?
- Very simple. From the plant reinforced concrete products. I acted on psychology.
- Like this?
— I went to the plant. I got into the tractor. I tied an iron grease barrel to the back. I'm going on duty. The barrel rumbles. A guard appears: “Where are you taking the barrel?” I answer: “For personal reasons.” - “Are there any documents?” - "No". - “Unfasten the hairdryer...” I untied the barrel and drove on. In general, the psychology worked.
23. I walked and thought - the world is gripped by madness. Madness becomes the norm. The norm evokes a sense of miracle.
24. I used to drink quite a lot. And, accordingly, he hung out anywhere. Because of this, many people thought that I was sociable. Although as soon as I sobered up, my sociability disappeared.
25. I looked at the empty suitcase. At the bottom is Karl Marx. On the lid is Brodsky. And between them is a lost, priceless, only life.
Sergey Dovlatov- one of the most read Russian-speaking writers of the late twentieth century. But while living in his homeland, he was unable to reach the reader with his works: they saw the light only after his emigration to the USA and began to be published in Russia only in the second half of the 80s, when they gained enormous popularity.In his stories, absurdity acts as the basis of order in human destiny. His heroes, ordinary, seemingly unremarkable people, turn out to be bright and unique, precisely because of their carelessness and bad luck.
Dovlatov does not teach anyone anything and does not judge anyone. He does not have “positive” and “negative” heroes, it all depends on the point of view. Because this is the main truth of life. Dovlatov’s humorous and at the same time sad prose became a classic and, like any classic, went to the people in the form of proverbs and sayings:
- There is one painful moment in a conversation with a woman. You present facts, reasons, arguments. You appeal to logic and common sense. And suddenly you discover that she is disgusted by the very sound of your voice.
- Love, friendship, and respect are not connected as much as by a common hatred of something.
- A decent person is one who does nasty things without pleasure.
- Most people consider unsolvable those problems whose solution is of little satisfaction to them.
- People around them love not honest people, but kind ones. Not brave, but sensitive. Not principled, but condescending. In other words, unprincipled.
- Man is accustomed to asking himself: who am I? There is a scientist, an American, a driver, a Jew, an immigrant... But you should always ask yourself: am I shit?
It's not money that attracts women. Not cars or jewelry. Not restaurants and expensive clothes. Not power, wealth and elegance. And what made a person powerful, rich and elegant. A power that some are endowed with and others are completely deprived of.
- All my life I blew into a telescope and was surprised that there was no music. And then he looked carefully at the trombone and was surprised that he couldn’t see a damn thing.
- We endlessly scold Comrade Stalin, and, of course, for good reason. And yet I want to ask - who wrote four million denunciations?
- The only honest road is the path of mistakes, disappointments and hopes.
- Nothing else, but loneliness is enough. Money, let’s say, I run out quickly, loneliness never...
- It's crazy to live with a man who doesn't leave just because he's lazy...
- I walked and thought - the world is gripped by madness. Madness becomes the norm. The norm evokes a sense of miracle.
- Do you know what is important in life? The main thing is that there is only one life. A minute passed and it was over. There won't be another...
- The more hopeless the goal, the deeper the emotions.
- Love is for young people. For military personnel and athletes... But here everything is much more complicated. This is no longer love, but fate.
- The editor was a good-natured man. Of course, until the minute he became cruel and evil.
- I only light up when I'm drinking. And I drink constantly. Therefore, many people mistakenly think that I smoke.
- I felt disgusted and left. Or rather, he stayed.
- Don't ask God for more.
- I counted the money without taking my hand out of my pocket.
- There is no greater tragedy for a man than a complete lack of character!
- I prefer to be alone, but next to someone...
- I think love has no dimensions at all. There is only yes or no.
- A person can give anything to a person... Depending on the circumstances.
- It’s normal to go visit when called. It’s terrible to go on a visit when you don’t invite me. However, the best thing is when they call you and you don’t go.
- Family is if you guess by the sound who is washing in the shower.
- "Life is Beautiful and amazing!" - as Comrade Mayakovsky exclaimed on the eve of suicide.
I won't change the linoleum. I changed my mind because the world is doomed.
It’s been a long time since I’ve stopped dividing people into positive and negative. And even more so for literary heroes. In addition, I am not sure that in life a crime is inevitably followed by repentance, and a feat is followed by bliss. We are what we feel like.
