Best 12 quotes in «notes from the underground quotes» category

Don't you see, gentlemen? Reason is a fine thing, there's no question about it, but reason is only reason and only satisfies man's rational faculties, whereas desire is a manifestation of the whole of life, that is of the whole of human life, along with reason and all our head-scratching... not just the extraction of a square root.

I could not even imagine any place of secondary importance for myself, and for that very reason I quite contentedly occupied the most insignificant one in real life. Either a hero or dirt - there was no middle way. That turned out to be my undoing, for while wallowing in dirt I consoled myself with the thought that at other times I was a hero, and the hero overlaid the dirt: an ordinary mortal, as it were, was ashamed to wallow in dirt, but a hero was too exalted a person to be entirely covered in dirt, and hence I could wallow in dirt with an easy conscience.

Information paints no picture, sings no song, and writes no poem.

I'm now asking an idle question of my own: which is better--cheap happiness, or lofty suffering? Well, which is better?

The digital age believes in the rational ordering of human beings. We believe that information will eventually solve every conceivable problem.

I swear, gentlemen, that to be too conscious is an illness - a real thorough-going illness.

The only gain of civilisation for mankind is the greater capacity for variety of sensations - and absolutely nothing more.

t is of course clear that, owing to my unbounded vanity and hence also to my over-sensitiveness where my own person was concerned, I often looked at myself with a sort of furious dissatisfaction which verged on loathing, and for that reason I could not help attributing my own views to other people. I hated my own face, for instance, finding it odious to a degree and even suspecting that it had rather a mean expression, and so every time I arrived at the office I went through agonies in my efforts to assume as independent an air as possible so as to make sure that my colleagues did not suspect me of meanness and so as to give my face as noble an expression as possible. ‘What do I care,’ I thought to myself, ‘whether my face is ugly or not, so long as it is also noble, expressive, and above all, extremely intelligent.’ But I knew very well, I knew it agonisingly well, that it was quite impossible for my face to express such high qualities. But the really dreadful part was that I thought my face looked absolutely stupid. I would have been completely satisfied if it looked intelligent. Indeed, I’d have reconciled myself even to a mean expression so long as my face was at the same time generally admitted to be awfully intelligent.

A decent, educated man cannot afford the luxury of vanity without being exceedingly exacting with himself and without occasionally despising himself to the point of hatred.

But a man is a frivolous and incongruous creature, and perhaps, like a chess player, loves the process of the game, not the end of it.

Do not fear, you mind may be criticizes for losing track. Enjoy the fact that most may not ride the same train of thought.

We have an infinite supply of information and yet we cannot read.