They don't ask much of you. They only want you to hate the things you love and to love the things you despise.
Boris PasternakRead
He realised, more vividly than ever before, that art had two constant, two unending preoccupations: it is always meditating upon death and it is always thereby creating life.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Art reflects on death while simultaneously celebrating life.
Boris Pasternak’s quote suggests that at its core, art grapples with the themes of mortality and existence. By exploring the concept of death, artists are also compelled to evoke a sense of life, creating a profound connection between the two, as one cannot exist without the acknowledgment of the other in artistic expression.
Themes
ArtDeathLifeCreationExpression
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of art in our understanding of human existence.
More from Boris Pasternak
All quotes →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 PasternakRead
He is her glory. Any woman could say it. For every one of them, God is in her child. Mothers of great men must have been familiar with this feeling, but then, all women are mothers of great men -- it isn't their fault if life disappoints them later.
Boris PasternakRead
Our evenings are farewells. Our parties are testaments. So that the secret stream of suffering. May warm the cold of life.
Boris PasternakRead
The most extraordinary discoveries are made when the artist is overwhelmed by what he has to say.
Boris PasternakRead
Oh, how one wishes sometimes to escape from the meaningless dullness of human eloquence, from all those sublime phrases, to take refuge in nature, apparently so inarticulate, or in the wordlessness of long, grinding labor, of sound sleep, of true music, or of a human understanding rendered speechless by emotion!
Boris PasternakRead
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