Stanisław Jerzy Lec

"Every great writer has one single obsession, and Lec tells us: "I wanted to tell the world just one word. Unable to do it I became a writer." And in another aphorism one is reminded of Picasso as he characteristically moves towards his creation through a continual grappling with and destruction of chaotic forms: "What is chaos? It is the Order destroyed during Creation." It was also Picasso who memorably called art "a lie which tells the truth", and Lec comes pretty close to the maestro with this one: "A beautiful lie? Listen! That's creativity." Lec sums up the predicament of the one gifted with creative powers, the well-known neurotic, pathological condition of the artist, in such words: "The richer your imagination, the poorer you feel." But then Lec also assures him: "Every bush can burn if you fire it with your imagination." Yet all that anguish and loneliness may be worth it for: "To suffer heartaches and not be a poet? Whatever for?""

"Satirists, be careful. In the 1931 film by René Clair Vive la Liberte a song says, "Work is freedom." In 1940 the sign on the gates to Auschwitz said: "Arbeit macht frei.""

"Burząc pomniki, oszczędzajcie cokoły. Zawsze mogą się przydać."

"Optimists and pessimists differ only on the date of the end of the world."

"All of our separate fictions add up to joint reality."

"The moment of recognizing your own lack of talent is a flash of genius."

"Morality is either a social contract or you have to pay cash."

"Gdy z radości podskoczysz do góry, uważaj, by ci ktoś ziemi spod nóg nie usunął."

"When everything has to be right, something isn't."

"Open Sesame — I want to get out."

"The Order of the Garter usually goes to people who already have full wardrobes."

"It is the high priests that make demands — not the gods they serve."

"Żaden płatek śniegu nie czuje się odpowiedzialny za lawinę."

"Do not trust people. They are capable of greatness."

"He who had dug his own grave looks attentively at the gravedigger's work, but not pedantically: for this one digs a grave not for himself."

"Do not expect too much of the end of the world."

"Those who are ahead of their time often have to wait for it in uncomfortable quarters."

"Wszystko jest w rękach człowieka. Dlatego należy je często myć."

"Nawet w jego milczeniu były błędy językowe."

"Pogrożę mu tylko palcem – rzekł, kładąc go na cynglu."

"Czy jeżeli ludożerca je widelcem i nożem to postęp?"

"W walce idei giną ludzie."

"You will always find some Eskimos ready to instruct the Congolese on how to cope with heat waves."

"Hay smells different to lovers and horses."

"Do not ask God the way to heaven; he will show you the hardest one."

"The window to the world can be covered by a newspaper."

"Tłum krzyczy jednymi wielkimi ustami, ale je tysiącem małych."

"Politics: a Trojan horse race."

"Thoughts, like fleas, jump from man to man, but they don't bite everybody."

"Wer den Himmel auf Erden sucht, hat im Erdkundeunterricht geschlafen."

"Wenn ich ein zweites Mal geboren werde, laß ich mich gleich unter einem falschen Namen eintragen."

"Phantasie und Lüge sind zweierlei"

"Henker treten meist in Masken der Gerechtigkeit auf."

"Gibt es denn Worte genug, um alle Mäuler damit zu stopfen?"

"Die erste Vorbedingung für die Unsterblichkeit ist das Sterben."

"Manche leben mit einer so erstaunlichen Routine, dass es schwerfällt zu glauben, sie lebten zum ersten Mal."

"Von den meisten Büchern bleiben nur Zitate übrig. Warum nicht gleich nur Zitate schreiben?"

"Geben wir zu, wir sind auf jede Überraschung vorbereitet, nur die alltäglichen Dinge brechen über uns herein wie Katastrophen."

"Die meisten Menschen sind Mörder. Sie töten einen Menschen. In sich selbst."

"Alle Götter waren unsterblich!"

"Die Macht wechselt häufiger von Hand zu Hand als von Kopf zu Kopf."

"Auch auf einem Thron werden Hosen durchgesessen."