Gustave Flaubert

"You don’t make art out of good intentions."

"Do not read as children do to enjoy themselves, or, as the ambitious do to educate themselves. No, read to live."

"Love is a springtime plant that perfumes everything with its hope, even the ruins to which it clings."

"One mustn't ask apple trees for oranges, France for sun, women for love, life for happiness."

"Do not read, as children do, to amuse yourself, or like the ambitious, for the purpose of instruction. No, read in order to live."

"One mustn't ask apple trees for oranges, France for sun, women for love, life for happiness."

"Love is a springtime plant that perfumes everything with its hope, even the ruins to which it clings."

"Love is a springtime plant that perfumes everything with its hope, even the ruins to which it clings."

"There are two infinities that confuse me: the one in my soul devours me; the one around me will crush me"

"There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it"

"The public wants work which flatters its illusions."

"Be steady and well-ordered in your life so that you can be fierce and original in your work."

"Be steady and well-ordered in your life so that you can be fierce and original in your work."

"One can be the master of what one does, but never of what one feels."

"One mustn't ask apple trees for oranges, France for sun, women for love, life for happiness."

"God is only a word dreamed up to explain the world"

"An author in his book must be like God in the universe, present everywhere and visible nowhere."

"The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you feel rise in you a challenge to life, and the promise of future accomplishments."

"Do not read, as children do, to amuse yourself, or like the ambitious, for the purpose of instruction. No, read in order to live."

"When you reduce a woman to writing, she makes you think of a thousand other women"