Famous Elias Canetti Quotations

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"He who is obsessed by death is made guilty by it."
by Elias Canetti
"The self-explorer, whether he wants to or not, becomes the explorer of everything else. He learns to see himself, but suddenly, provided he was honest, all the rest appears, and it is as rich as he was, and, as a final crowning, richer."
by Elias Canetti
"A 'modern' man has nothing to add to modernism, if only because he has nothing to oppose it with. The well-adapted drop off the dead limb of time like lice."
by Elias Canetti
"Adults find pleasure in deceiving a child. They consider it necessary, but they also enjoy it. The children very quickly figure it out and then practice deception themselves."
by Elias Canetti
"Most religions do not make men better, only warier."
by Elias Canetti
"The great writers of aphorisms read as if they had all known each other well."
by Elias Canetti
"Someone who always has to lie discovers that every one of his lies is true."
by Elias Canetti
"There is no doubt: the study of man is just beginning, at the same time that his end is in sight."
by Elias Canetti
"It doesn't matter how new an idea is: what matters is how new it becomes."
by Elias Canetti
"The paranoiac is the exact image of the ruler. The only difference is their position in the world. One might even think the paranoiac the more impressive of the two because he is sufficient unto himself and cannot be shaken by failure."
by Elias Canetti
"A modern man has nothing to add to modernism, if only because he has nothing to oppose it with. The well-adapted drop off the dead limb of time like lice."
by Elias Canetti
"There is nothing that man fears more than the touch of the unknown. He wants to see what is reaching towards him, and to be able to recognize or at least classify it. Man always tends to avoid physical contact with anything strange."
by Elias Canetti
"Pessimists are not boring. Pessimists are right. Pessimists are superfluous."
by Elias Canetti


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