Ivan Turgenev Quotes & Sayings

And was it his destined part /
Only one moment in his life /
To be close to your heart? — Ivan Turgenev

There's only one way for an individual to remain upright, not to fall to pieces, not to sink into the mire of self-oblivionorself-contempt. That's calmly to turn away from everything, to say, "Enough!" and, folding one's useless arms across one's empty breast, to retain the ultimate, the sole attainable virtue, the virtue of recognizing one's own insignificance. — Ivan Turgenev

Death is like a fisherman, who, having caught a fish in his net, leaves it in the water for a time; the fish continues to swim about, but all the while the net is round it, and the fisherman will snatch it out in his own good time. — Ivan Turgenev

Even nightingales can't be fed on fairy tales. — Ivan Turgenev

A person who gets angry at his own illness is sure to overcome it — Ivan Turgenev

However passionate, sinning, and rebellious the heart hidden in the tomb, the flowers growing over it peep serenely at us with their innocent eyes; they tell us not of eternal peace alone, of that great peace of "indifferent" nature: they tell us, too, of eternal reconciliation and of life without end. — Ivan Turgenev

She found it sinful and expensive to have sugar in her tea, although she herself never spent a penny on anything. — Ivan Turgenev

What's important is that twice two is four and all the rest's nonsense. — Ivan Turgenev

Love isn't actually a feeling at all
it's an illness, a certain condition of body and soul ... Usually it takes possession of someone without his permission, all of a sudden, against his will
just like cholera or a fever. — Ivan Turgenev

What did I hope for, what did I expect, what rich future did I foresee, when the phantom of my first love, rising up for an instant, barely called forth one sigh, one mournful sentiment? — Ivan Turgenev

Death's an old story, but new for each person. — Ivan Turgenev

Words indeed have been my ruin; they have consumed me, and to the end I cannot be free of them. — Ivan Turgenev

I? Believe me, Zinaida Alexandrovna, that whatever you did, however much you make me suffer, I shall love you and adore you to the end of my days. — Ivan Turgenev

Yes" Bazarov began, "man's a strange being. When you look at a quiet, dull life, like my good parents' life here, cursorily or from a distance, you think - what could be better? Eat, drink and know you're acting in the most correct, sensible way. But that's not how it is. Boredom descends. You want to engage with people, even if just to shout at them, but still engage with them. — Ivan Turgenev

But I think that I have already been moving too long in a sphere which is not my own. Flying fishes can hold out for a time in the air, but soon they must splash back into the water; allow me, too, to paddle in my own element. — Ivan Turgenev

Nezhdanov's heart began to beat violently and he lowered his eyes involuntarily. This girl, who had fallen in love with a homeless wretch like him, who trusted him, who was ready to follow him, to go with him towards one and the same goal - this wonderful girl - Marianna - at that moment was, for Nezhdanov, the embodiment of everything good and just on earth; the embodiment of that love, that of a family, sister or wife, which he had not experienced; the embodiment of homeland, happiness, struggle and freedom. — Ivan Turgenev

To be young and not to know how, is bearable; to be old and not have the strength, is too great a weight to carry. And what's is so painful you can't sense your powers leaving you. It's hard for an old man to ensure such blows! — Ivan Turgenev

Time sometimes flies like a bird, sometimes crawls like a snail; but a man is happiest when he does not even notice whether it passes swiftly or slowly. — Ivan Turgenev

while the sun and wind played gently in its spreading branches; the bells of the Donskoy monastery would sometimes float across
tranquil and sad
and I would sit and gaze and listen, and would be filled with a nameless sensation which had everything in it; sorrow and joy, a premonition of the future, and desire, and fear of life. — Ivan Turgenev

I was afraid of looking into my heart ... afraid of thinking seriously about anything ... I did not want to know whether I was loved, and I did not want to admit to myself that I was not loved ... — Ivan Turgenev

You are an old pig!'one of them said to the other. 'And that is worse than being a young one. — Ivan Turgenev

Looking about me, listening and recalling what the day had been like, I suddenly felt a secret unease in my heart and raised my eyes to the sky, but even in the sky there seemed to be no tranquillity. Dotted with stars, it constantly quivered and danced and shivered. — Ivan Turgenev

Tempered, gradual animation, the methodical restrain of sensations and energies, the equilibrium of sickness and health in each creature
this is nature's essence, its immutable law, this is what it's based on and what it adheres to. — Ivan Turgenev

Whatever man prays for, he prays for a miracle. Every prayer reduces itself ... — Ivan Turgenev

Youth eats all the sugared fancy cakes and regards them as its daily bread. But there'll come a time when you'll start asking just for a crust. — Ivan Turgenev

After all, when you think of it, nothing is stronger in the world...and weaker--than a word! — Ivan Turgenev

Was coming to that troubled twilight time, a time of regrets that resemble hopes, of hopes that resemble regrets, when youth is past but old age has not yet come. — Ivan Turgenev

Death is something ancient, but it comes fresh to each of us. — Ivan Turgenev

Nature's not a temple, but a workshop, and man's the workman in it. — Ivan Turgenev

I do not know what the heart of a bad man is like. But i do know what the heart of a good man is like. And it is terrible. — Ivan Turgenev

All human beings hang by a thread, an abyss may open under their feet at any moment, and yet they have to go and invent all sortsof difficulties for themselves and spoil their lives. — Ivan Turgenev

Art, if one employs this term in the broad sense that includes poetry within its realm, is an art of creation laden with ideals, located at the very core of the life of a people, defining the spiritual and moral shape of that life. — Ivan Turgenev

The temerity to believe in nothing. — Ivan Turgenev

Don't force me into saying what I don't want to say, and what I won't say. — Ivan Turgenev

Nothing is worse and more hurtful than a happiness that comes too late. It can give no pleasure, yet it deprives you of that most precious of rights - the right to swear and curse at your fate! — Ivan Turgenev

Run along, my friend, Andrei Petrovitch, put a hat on your learned head, and let us go where our eyes lead us. Our eyes are young
they may lead us far. — Ivan Turgenev

The deep, pure blue stirs on one's lips a smile, innocent as itself; like the clouds over the sky, and, as it were, with them, happy memories pass in slow procession over the soul — Ivan Turgenev

They had much discussion upon the question whether marriage was a prejudice or a crime, and whether men were born equal or not, and precisely what individuality consists in. Things — Ivan Turgenev

And here am I ... what did I hope - what did I expect? What rich promise did the future seem to hold out to me, when with scarcely a sigh - only a bleak sense of utter desolation - I took my leave from the brief phantom, risen for a fleeting instant, of my first love?
What has come of it all - of all that I had hoped for? And now when the shades of evening are beginning to close in upon my life, what have I left that is fresher, dearer to me, than the memories of that brief storm that came and went so swiftly one morning in spring? — Ivan Turgenev

People without firmness of character love to make up a fate for themselves; that relieves them of the necessity of having their own will and of taking responsibility for themselves. — Ivan Turgenev

Behind me there are already so many memories ( ... ) Lots of memories, but no point in remembering them, and ahead of me a long, long road with nothing to aim for ... I just don't want to go along it. — Ivan Turgenev

Deny everything and you will easily pass for a man of ability; it's a well known trick. Simple hearted people are quite ready to conclude that you are worth more than what you deny. And that's often an error. In the first place, you can pick holes in anything; and secondly, even if you are right in what you say, it's the worse for you, your intellect, directed by simple negation, grows colorless and withers up. While you gratify your vanity, you are deprived of the true consolations of thought;life--the essence of life--evades your jaundiced and petty criticism, and you end by scolding and becoming ridiculous. Only one who loves has the right to censure and find fault. — Ivan Turgenev

Circumstances define us; they force us onto one road or another, and then they punish us for it. — Ivan Turgenev

There was nothing ugly in the small, unprepossessing figure of this emancipated woman, but the expression on her face made a bad impression on the viewer. One felt inclined to ask: "What's the matter? Are you hungry? Bored? Afraid? Why so tense?" Just like Sitnikov, she was always anxious. She spoke and moved in a rather casual, though awkward,manner: she obviously considered herself a good-natured, simple creature; at the same time, no matter what she did, it always seemed that she didn't want to be doing that. Everything she did appeared to be done on purpose, as children say, that is, neither simply nor naturally. — Ivan Turgenev

Who among us has the strength to oppose petty egoism, those petty good feelings, pity and remorse? — Ivan Turgenev

From lips indifferent of her death I heard,
Indifferently I listened to it, too,'
were echoing in my heart. O youth, youth! little dost thou care for anything; thou art master, as it were, of all the treasures of the universe - even sorrow gives thee pleasure, even grief thou canst turn to thy profit; thou art self-confident and insolent; thou sayest, 'I alone am living - look you!' - but thy days fly by all the while, and vanish without trace or reckoning; and everything in thee vanishes, like wax in the sun, like snow ... . And, perhaps, the whole secret of thy charm lies, not in being able to do anything, but in being able to think thou wilt do anything; lies just in thy throwing to the winds, forces which thou couldst not make other use of; in each of us gravely regarding himself as a prodigal, gravely supposing that he is justified in saying, 'Oh, what might I not have done if I had not wasted my time! — Ivan Turgenev

[ ... ] no carrot would be permitted in a soup that had not first assumed a rhomboidal or trapezoidal shape. — Ivan Turgenev

Whereas I think: I'm lying here in a haystack ... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitesimal in comparison with the rest of space, which I don't occupy and which has no relation to me. And the period of time in which I'm fated to live is so insignificant beside the eternity in which I haven't existed and won't exist ... And yet in this atom, this mathematical point, blood is circulating, a brain is working, desiring something ... What chaos! What a farce! — Ivan Turgenev

I only know that I feel tired, antiquated; I feel as though I had been living a long, long time. — Ivan Turgenev

There's something tragic in the fate of almost every person
it's just that the tragic is often concealed from a person by the banal surface of life ... A woman will complain of indigestion and not even know that what she means is that her whole life has been shattered. — Ivan Turgenev

Oh we have hard times to live through, those of us who are born spectators. — Ivan Turgenev

First we've got to clear the ground. — Ivan Turgenev

As for work, without it, without painstaking work, any writer or artist definitely remains a dilettante; there's no point in waiting for so-called blissful moments, for inspiration; if it comes, so much the better
but you keep working anyway. — Ivan Turgenev

One doesn't know what one doesn't know. — Ivan Turgenev

How sad that youth, with all its power,
Was given us in vain, to burn;
That we betrayed it every hour,
And were deceived by it in turn; — Ivan Turgenev

The enchanted world arising out of the dim mists of the past, into which he just stepped, quivered-and disappeared. — Ivan Turgenev

I walked in the meadows of green grieving for my life. — Ivan Turgenev

His little eyes, which looked as if they'd literally been hammered into place, gazed out fixedly and uncomfortably, and he also had a way of laughing uncomfortably with an abrupt, wooden laugh. — Ivan Turgenev

In his funeral oration the spokesman of the most artistic and critical of European nations, Ernest Renan, hailed him as one of the greatest writers of our times: 'The Master, whose exquisite works have charmed our century, stands more than any other man as the incarnation of a whole race,' because 'a whole world lived in him and spoke through his mouth.' Not the Russian world only, we may add, but the whole Slavonic world, to which it was 'an honour to have been expressed by so great a Master. — Ivan Turgenev

I am a flirt: I have no heart: I have an actor's nature. — Ivan Turgenev

It's amazing how man still believes in words. For example, if you call him a fool and don't beat him, he'll be wretched. Call him a genius and don't give him any money - he'll be quite satisfied. — Ivan Turgenev

A man's capable of understanding anything - how the ether vibrates, and what's going on in the sun - but how any other man can blow his nose differently from him, that he's incapable of understanding. — Ivan Turgenev

Illness isn't the only thing that spoils the appetite. — Ivan Turgenev

If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything is ready, we shall never begin. — Ivan Turgenev

I share no man's opinions; I have my own. — Ivan Turgenev

We act by virtue of what we recognize as beneficial. At the present time, negation is the most beneficial of all - and we deny. — Ivan Turgenev

She tore herself away, and went out. And I went away. I cannot describe the emotion with which I went away. I should not wish it ever to come again; but I should think myself unfortunate had I never experienced such an emotion. — Ivan Turgenev

This is the only thing that makes life worth living. If you have succeeded in doing something you wanted to do, something that seemed impossible - well, then, make the most of it, with all your heart, to the very brim. — Ivan Turgenev

He's, he's deserted us," he stammered, "deserted us. He got bored here with us. I'm all alone in the world, like this finger, all alone!" he repeated several times and each time held out his hand in front of him, sticking out his index finger. Then Arina Vlasyevna came next to him and, laying her grey head by his, said, "what can we do, Vasya! Our son has left the nest. Like a falcon he came to us when he wanted to, and when he wanted to he flew off. And you and I sit side by side and can't move, like mushrooms on a hollow tree. Only I'll be your true one for ever and you'll be mine. — Ivan Turgenev

I assure you, Alexandra Pavlovna,' said Pigasov slowly, 'nothing can be worse and more injurious than good-fortune that comes too late. It cannot give you pleasure in any way, and it deprives you of the right
the precious right
of complaining and cursing Providence. Yes, madam, it's a cruel and insulting trick
belated fortune. — Ivan Turgenev

As we all know, time sometimes flies like a bird, and sometimes
crawls like a worm, but people may be unusually happy when they do not
even notice whether time has passed quickly or slowly — Ivan Turgenev

What a magnificent body, how I should like to see it on the dissecting table. — Ivan Turgenev

A poet must be a psychologist, but a secret one: he should know and feel the roots of phenomena but present only the phenomena themselves in full bloom or as they fade away. — Ivan Turgenev

Everyone needs help from everyone else. — Ivan Turgenev

Most people can't understand how others can blow their noses differently than they do. — Ivan Turgenev

Both men felt uncomfortable. Each knew the other understood him. That kind of knowledge is agreeable for friends, and for enemies very disagreeable, especially when they can't either have it out or separate. — Ivan Turgenev

You may live a long while with some people and be on friendly terms with them and never speak openly with them from your soul. — Ivan Turgenev

Go and try to disprove death. Death will disprove you, and that's all! — Ivan Turgenev

We're young, we're not monsters, no fools: we'll conquer happiness for ourselves. — Ivan Turgenev

Take for yourself what you can, and don't be ruled by others; to belong to oneself - the whole savour of life lies in that. — Ivan Turgenev

I could not simplify myself.
(From the suicide note of a character named Nejdanov) — Ivan Turgenev

I think; here I lie under a haystack ... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitely small in comparison with the rest of space, in which I am not, and which has nothing to do with me; and the period of time in which it is my lot to live is so petty beside the eternity in which I have not been, and shall not be ... And in this atom, this mathematical point, the blood is circulating, the brain is working and wanting something ... Isn't it loathsome? Isn't it petty? — Ivan Turgenev

But I had absolutely lost all sense of personal dignity, and could not tear myself away from the spectacle of my own misery. — Ivan Turgenev

Whatever a man prays for, he prays for a miracle. Every prayer reduces itself to this: Great God, grant that twice two be not four. — Ivan Turgenev

My blood was in a ferment within me, my heart was full of longing, sweetly and foolishly; I was all expectancy and wonder; I was tremulous and waiting; my fancy fluttered and circled about the same images like martins round a bell-tower at dawn; I dreamed and was sad and sometimes cried. But through the tears and the melancholy, inspired by the music of verse or the beauty of the evening, there always rose upwards, like the grasses of early spring, shoots of happy feeling, of young and surging life. — Ivan Turgenev

We sit in the mud, my friend, and reach for the stars. — Ivan Turgenev

What's terrible is that there's nothing terrible, that the very essence of life is petty, uninteresting, and degradingly trite. — Ivan Turgenev

O youth! youth! you have no concerns, you possess, as it were, all the treasures of the universe, even grief is a comfort to you, even sadness suits your looks, you are self-assured and bold, you say: 'Look, I'm the only one alive!' while the very days of your life run away and vanish without a trace and without number and everything in you disappears like wax, like snow in the hear of the sun... And perhaps the entire et of your charm consists not in the possibility of doing everything, but in the possibility of thinking perhaps it consists precisely in the fact that you want only to scatter on the wind energies that you wouldn't know how to use for anything else, perhaps it consists in the fact that each one of us seriously regards himself as a spendthrift and seriously considers that he has the right to say: 'Oh, the things I could have done if only I hadn't wasted my time! — Ivan Turgenev

Do you know what really makes man free?'
'What?'
'Will, your own will, and it gives power which is better than liberty. Know how to want, and you'll be free, and you'll be master too. — Ivan Turgenev

A dry maple leaf has come off and is falling to the earth; its movement is exactly like a butterfly's flight. Isn't it strange? Gloom and decay - like brightness and life. — Ivan Turgenev

I burnt as in a fire in her presence ... but what did I care to know what the fire was in which I burned and melted
it was enough that it was sweet to burn and melt. — Ivan Turgenev

I gave myself up to fruitless speculation, and was always looking for secluded places. I became particularly fond of the ruined greenhouse. I used to climb, I remember, on to the high wall, settle myself on it and sit there, a youth afflicted by such misery, solitude and grief that I would be overcome with self-pity. How I reveled in these melancholy feelings - how I adored them. — Ivan Turgenev

The "why not" of youth, the secret desire to know his luck, to try his strength all on his own without the support of another, eventually won through. — Ivan Turgenev

He went to bed early, but could not fall asleep. He was haunted by sad and gloomy reflections about the inevitable end - death. These thoughts were familiar to him, many times had he turned them over this way and that, first shuddering at the probability of annihilation, then welcoming it, almost rejoicing in it. Suddenly a peculiarly familiar agitation took possession of him ... He mused awhile, sat down at the table, and wrote down the following lines in his sacred copy-book, without a single correction: — Ivan Turgenev

It's all romanticism, nonsense, rottenness, art. — Ivan Turgenev

Nowhere does time pass as swiftly as in Russia, though they say that in prison it passes even more quickly. — Ivan Turgenev

The fact is that previously they were simply dunces and now they've suddenly become nihilists. — Ivan Turgenev

Weak people never put an end to things themselves. They always wait for the end. — Ivan Turgenev

I want everything or nothing. A life for a life, taking one and giving up another without hesitation and beyond recall. Or else better have nothing! — Ivan Turgenev

I've become convinced that every person should treat himself strictly and even rudely and distrustfully; it's difficult to tame the beast in oneself. — Ivan Turgenev