Andre Maurois quotes:

A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.

We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity - romantic love and gunpowder.

Often we allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. We lose many irreplaceable hours brooding over grievances that, in a year's time, will be forgotten by us and by everybody. No, let us devote our life to worthwhile actions and feelings, to great thoughts, real affections and enduring undertakings.

Growing old is no more than a bad habit which a busy person has no time to form.

Memory is a great artist. For every man and for every woman it makes the recollection of his or her life a work of art and an unfaithful record.

The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.

The effectiveness of work increases according to geometric progression if there are no interruptions.

Smile, for everyone lacks self-confidence and more than any other one thing a smile reassures them.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us. The most solid happiness can be shaken by the compassion of a fool.

We appreciate frankness from those who like us. Frankness from others is called insolence.

Style is the hallmark of a temperament stamped upon the material at hand.

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such. All leaders whose fitness is questioned are clearly lacking in force.

People are what you make them. A scornful look turns into a complete fool a man of average intelligence. A contemptuous indifference turns into an enemy a woman who, well treated, might have been an angel.

British conversation is like a game of cricket or a boxing match; personal allusions are forbidden like hitting below the belt, and anyone who loses his temper is disqualified.

Without a family, man, alone in the world, trembles with the cold.

Conversation would be vastly improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us.

A marriage without conflicts is almost as inconceivable as a nation without crises.

The need to express one's self in writing springs from a maladjustment of life, or from an inner conflict which the adolescent (or the grown man) cannot resolve in action.

Business is a combination of war and sport.

An old man, having retired from active life, regains the gaity and irresponsibility of childhood. He is ready to play, he cannot run with his son, but he can totter with his grandson. Our first and last steps have the same rhythm.

Men and women are not born inconstant: they are made so by their early amorous experiences.

In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others.

The minds of different generations are as impenetrable one by the other as are the monads of Leibniz.

Information is not culture. In the mind of a truly educated person, facts are organized, and they make up a living world in the image of the world of reality.

To feminine eyes a man's prestige, or his fame, envelops him in a luminous haze which obscures his faults. The triumphs of an aviator, an actor, a football player, an orator are often responsible for the beginning of a love affair.

The really great novel tends to be the exact negative of its author's life.

What men call friendship is only social intercourse, an exchange of favours and good offices; it comes down to a commercial dealing in which self-esteem always expects to profit.

Two human beings anchored to one another are like two ships shaken by waves; their carcases collide with one another and creak.

[] marriage is one thing, and love is anotherYou need to have a solid canvas; nobody stops you to weave the arabesques

There are certain persons for whom pure Truth is a poison.

To desire to be perpetually in the society of a pretty woman until the end of one's days, is as if, because one likes good wine, one wished always to have one's mouth full of it.

Old age is far more than white hair, wrinkles, the feeling that it is too late and the game finished, that the stage belongs to the rising generations. The true evil is not the weakening of the body, but the indifference of the soul.

All of us, from time to time, need a plunge into freedom and novelty, after which routine and discipline will seem delightful by contrast

If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.

Happiness is never there to stay [...] Happiness is merely a respite offered by inquietude.

[...] marriage is one thing, and love is another...You need to have a solid canvas; nobody stops you to weave the arabesques...

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.

A successful marriage is an edifice that must be rebuilt every day.

If, in New York, you arrive late for an appointment, say, "I took a taxi".

Modesty and unselfishness - these are the virtues which men praise - and pass by.

To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.

No one can be profoundly original who does not avoid eccentricity.

If you value a man's regard, strive with him. As to liking, you like your newspaper - and despise it.

Like a bird, when his cage is opened, stays on his perch, dazzled by freedom, the postponed traveler does not see that his cage, with its bars of anxiety, it is open.

Among the idle rich, boredom is one of the most common causes of unhappiness. People who have difficulty in earning their living may suffer greatly, but they are not bored. Wealthy men and women become bored when they depend upon the theater for their enjoyment instead of making their own lives interesting.

Every ten years you should delete from your mind a few ideas that your experience has proven to be false.

Marriage is not something that can be accomplished all at once; it has to be constantly reaccomplished. A couple must never indulge in idle tranquility with the remark: "The game is won; let's relax." The game is never won. The chances of life are such that anything is possible. Remember what the dangers are for both sexes in middle age. A successful marriage is an edifice that must be rebuilt every day.

One has very little influence upon one's children. Their characters are what they are and one can do nothing to change them.

Style is the outcome of constraint.

The reading of a fine book is an uninterrupted dialogue in which the book speaks and our soul replies.

If you create an act, you create a habit. If you create a habit, you create a character. If you create a character, you create a destiny.

Genius consists of equal parts of natural aptitude and hard work.

Either the soul is immortal and we shall not die, or it perishes with the flesh, and we shall not know that we are dead. Live, then, as if you were eternal.

Medicine is a very old joke, but it still goes on.

Experience is valuable only when it has brought suffering and when the suffering has left its mark upon both body and mind.

Live as if you were eternal.

People are discontent; men are troubled; and the literature is excellent.

Marriage makes a man more vulnerable by doubling the expanse of sail exposed to the tempests of social life.

A great man's manias must be respected, because the time required to combat them is too precious to waste.

Old age diminishes our strength; it takes away our pleasures one after the other; it withers the soul as well as the body; it renders adventure and friendship difficult; and finally it is shadowed by thoughts of death.

Only passions can raise a man above the level of the animal.

The art of growing old is the art of being regarded by the oncoming generations as a support and not as a stumbling-block.

It is often said that in prosperity we have many friends, but that we are usually neglected when things go badly. I disagree. Not only do malicious people flock about us in order to witness our ruin, but other unfortunates as well, who have been kept away by our happiness, and now feel close to us on account of our troubles.

The reputation of a Don Juan gives to a man the most dangerous power. Wise virgins resist it, but foolish virgins frequently yield to the desire to take a celebrated lover from a rival - even from a friend. This emotion is a complex one, mad up of vanity, respect for another woman's taste, and the need to establish self-assurance by winning a difficult victory. Don Juan chose his first mistresses; later he was chosen.

A true woman loves a strong man because she knows his weaknesses. She protects as much as she is protected.

Love born of anxiety resembles a thorn shaped so that efforts to pull it out of one's flesh merely cause it to penetrate more deeply therein.

The longer the road to love, the keener is the pleasure.

It is restful to leave one's home; not because traveling does not entail varied and difficult daily actions, but because it removes our responsibilities.

It is not events and the things one sees and enjoys that produce happiness, but a state of mind which can endow events with its own quality, and we must hope for the duration of this state rather than the recurrence of pleasurable events.

Happiness flourishes where there is happiness.

I knew a man who had been virtually drowned and then revived. He said that his death had not been painful.

We don't go to school to learn, but to be soaked in the prejudices of our class, without which we should be useless and unhappy.

An unsatisfied woman requires luxury, but a woman who is in love with a man will lie on a board.

A great statesman, like a good housekeeper, knows that cleaning has to be done every morning.

Stupidity is a factor to be reckoned with in human affairs. The true leader always expects to encounter it, and prepares to endure it patiently so long as it is normal stupidity. He knows that his ideas will be distorted, his orders carelessly executed; and that there will be jealousy among his assistants. He takes these inevitable phenomena into account, and instead of attempting to find men without faults, who are non-existent, he tries to make use of the best men at his disposal - as they are, and not as they ought to be.

A gentleman is never in a hurry.

We console ourselves with several friends for not having found one real one.

There are very few really brilliant men who have not had at least one madman among their ancestors.

Novelty, the most potent of all attractions, is also the most perishable.

A great writer has a high respect for values. His essential function is to raise life to the dignity of thought, and this he does by giving it a shape.

The clear and simple words of common usage are always better than those of erudition. The jargon of the philosophers not seldom conceals an absence of thought.

To reason with poorly chosen words is like using a pair of scales with inaccurate weights.

He who has found a good wife has found great happiness, but a quarrelsome woman is like a roof that lets in the rain.

Woman's great strength lies in being late or absent. Presence immediately reveals the weak points of our beloved; when she is absent she become one of the sylph-like figures of our adolescence whom we endowed with perfection.

Time is a factor in all action. An imperfect scheme put into action at the proper time is better than a perfect one accomplished too late.

Everything that is in agreement with our personal desires seems true. Everything that is not puts us in a rage.

Art is an effort to create, beside the real world, a more humane world.

Men fear silence as they fear solitude, because both give them a glimpse of the terror of life's nothingness.

A great biography should, like the close of a great drama, leave behind it a feeling of serenity. We collect into a small bunch the flowers, the few flowers, which brought sweetness into a life, and present it as an offering to an accomplished destiny. It is the dying refrain of a completed song, the final verse of a finished poem.

Our minds have unbelievable power over our bodies.

It is better to teach a few things perfectly than many things indifferently.

When you become used to never being alone, you may consider yourself Americanised

The greedy search for money or success will almost always lead men into unhappiness. Why? Because that kind of life makes them depend upon things outside themselves.

Lost Illusion is the undisclosed title of every novel.

The difficult part in an argument is not to defend one's opinion but rather to know it.

We can talk frankly about our defects only to those who recognise our qualities.

The art of reading is in great part that of acquiring a better understanding of life from one's encounter with it in a book.

A friend loves you for your intelligence, a mistress for your charm, but your family's love is unreasoning; you were born into it and are of its flesh and blood. Nevertheless it can irritate you more than any group of people in the world.

Few are they who have never had a chance to achieve happiness- and fewer those who have taken that chance.

Advice is always a confession.

In a discussion, the difficulty lies, not in being able to defend your opinion, but to know it.

Learning is nothing without cultivated manners, but when the two are combined in a woman, you have one of the most exquisite products of civilization.

Sincerity is glass, discretion is diamond.

We don't love a woman for what she says, we like what she says because we love her.

The need to express oneself in writing springs from a mal-adjustment to life, or from an inner conflict which the adolescent (or the grown man) cannot resolve in action. Those to whom action comes as easily as breathing rarely feel the need to break loose from the real, to rise above, and describe it... I do not mean that it is enough to be maladjusted to become a great writer, but writing is, for some, a method of resolving a conflict, provided they have the necessary talent.

Almost all great writers have as their motif, more or less disguised, the passage from childhood to maturity, the clash between the thrill of expectation and the disillusioning knowledge of truth. 'Lost Illusion' is the undisclosed title of every novel.

Writing is a difficult trade which must be learned slowly by reading great authors; by trying at the outset to imitate them; by daring then to be original; by destroying one's first productions.

There are deserts in every life, and the desert must be depicted if we are to give a fair and complete idea of the country.

A man cannot free himself from the past more easily than he can from his own body.

You don't love a man for what he says, but love what he says because you love him.

Housekeeping in common is for women the acid test.

All of us, from time to time, need a plunge into freedom and novelty, after which routine and discipline will seem delightful by contrast.

If you create a character, you create a destiny.

Inspiration in matters of taste will not come twice.

He who wants to do everything will never do anything.

For intelligent people, action often means escape from thought, but it is a reasonable and a wise escape.