Antonio Munoz Molina Quotes & Sayings

One can criticize the Israeli government, but it is not fair to judge the people of Israel. — Antonio Munoz Molina

A writer doesn't write about just anything. He writes about things he has an affinity for. — Antonio Munoz Molina

Many of the books I read, I had to read them in French, English, or Italian, because they hadn't been translated into Spanish. — Antonio Munoz Molina

There can be no better prize for a writer than one awarded by an international book fair. — Antonio Munoz Molina

words, literature, are not in the consciousness of the person who writes but in his fingers and the paper and the typewriter, just like the statues of Michelangelo were in the block of marble where they were revealed. — Antonio Munoz Molina

If, as a Spaniard, I am so often offended by the stereotypes that abound regarding my country, how can I accept and repeat the ones that fall even more heavily upon Israel? — Antonio Munoz Molina

Nothing good ever happens by itself - it is achieved through striving, though this sometimes bears a high price. — Antonio Munoz Molina

Here in Spain, there are Argentine Jews, children and grandchildren of immigrants of Jews who fled Germany or Austria in the thirties, and in the seventies during the dictatorship, they had to go into exile again. — Antonio Munoz Molina

Money makes people bold and cosmopolitan; if you are poor, you are naturally conservative. It's not easy to be a bohemian when you have to worry about what is going to happen with you and with your next paycheck. — Antonio Munoz Molina

The worth of a prize depends on the people who have received it before you. — Antonio Munoz Molina

The '80s was the time for the great so-called modernization in Spain. It was a moment when it seemed that everything was breaking up and moving fast into modernity. — Antonio Munoz Molina

I have spent a great deal of my life being part of minorities. Some of the people I admire the most in the world have had the courage to defend, against wind and tide, minority viewpoints in those frightening times when any disagreement with universal conformity is identified as treason. — Antonio Munoz Molina

You can not fully read a book without being alone. But through this very solitude you become intimately involved with people whom you might never have met otherwise, either because they have been dead for centuries or because they spoke languages you cannot understand. And, nonetheless, they have become your closest friends, your wisest advisors, the wizards that hypnotize you, the lovers you have always dreamed of.
— Antonio Munoz Molina

There are two types of stories: public and private. — Antonio Munoz Molina

If you're well-known, you're at the risk of becoming your own character. When you're alone, as a writer, you have to be unknown, putting it all on the paper. — Antonio Munoz Molina

Cervantes is the most important Spanish writer. But he is not the most representative of the Spanish. His irony, his sense of humor - they are too subtle to seem Spanish. — Antonio Munoz Molina

People think that dreams are better than reality but this is not always the case; sometimes, because you dream too much, you are unable to see what you have in front of your very eyes. — Antonio Munoz Molina

The fact that evil exists in the world bothers me. I think that people do terrible things for ideological or political reasons. I think that evil stems from ideology. People are taught to hate. — Antonio Munoz Molina

An idea like equality between men and women, which is now accepted in the West, is quite new. — Antonio Munoz Molina

A few British suffragettes everybody laughed at started the cause of equality between men and women. — Antonio Munoz Molina

Shakespeare is a permanent presence in the English letters. — Antonio Munoz Molina

When I write short fiction or novellas, I like to leave a hint of the fantastic, of the unreal. If you write a completely fantastic novel with ghosts and everything, the effect is less powerful than if you portray an absolutely realistic situation and, in the middle of this, you put a layer of fantasy, of mystery. — Antonio Munoz Molina

I have absolute respect for Israel and people in Israel who are critical of their own country. — Antonio Munoz Molina

As a writer, you live in permanent self-doubt; you're on permanent trial. — Antonio Munoz Molina

I'm afraid I have an incurable urge for teaching. — Antonio Munoz Molina