Quotes by Finnish Authors - Page 2

For her a day of pampering meant comic books, black liquorice, serious exercise, veggie curry and, above all, solitude.
Salla Simukka
a person can also find solitude with others, though it is more difficult
Tove Jansson
You don't think you're a vampire, Sam. That kind of thing you know.
Jennifer Loiske
He hugged me, and I let him press me against his godlike body. What? A girl should have some fun sometimes.
Jennifer Loiske
Could I be brave enough to look lower? I could. His black tee shirt licked his hard body and I could only guess what was hidden underneath it. His faded jeans hung dangerously low, revealing a slice of his narrow hips, and I could easily imagine the rest.
Jennifer Loiske
There are empty spaces that must be respected – those often long periods when a person can’t see the pictures or find the words and needs to be left alone.
Tove Jansson
Ella had asked the writer how it felt to see her own works published. Seläntö had smiled sweetly at her and whispered, “You know what? It makes you understand why a dog eats its own vomit.
Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen
Quite, quite,' she thought with a little sigh. 'It's always like this in their adventures. To save and be saved. I wish somebody would write a story sometime about the people who warm up the heroes afterward.
Tove Jansson
Mobile is the digital gateway for the real world.
Tomi Ahonen
My message for all my readers is: Don't believe in those who claim that youth is a passing disease you just have to get rid of. Don't believe, that maturity is a goal and an asset to go after. Nothing will ever be ready, that is what makes life interesting. Read!
Tuula Kallioniemi
Where's your home, then?" asked the Snork Maiden."Nowhere" said Snufkin a little sadly, "or everywhere. It depends on how you look at it.""Haven't you got a mother?" asked Moomintroll, looking very sorry for him."I don't know," said Snufkin. "They tell me I was found in a basket.""Like Moses," said Sniff."I like the story about Moses," said the Snork. "But I think his mother could have found a better way of saving him, don't you? The crocodiles might have eaten him up.""They nearly ate us up," said Sniff.
Tove Jansson
I wish I was more Moomin-minded.
Tove Jansson
Besides, I don’t understand people who read a book for pleasure and then ruminate on the book’s ideas. Paper was invented so we wouldn’t have to keep all those thoughts in our heads.
Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen
But no sooner had morning broken than he took hold of his whip and ceremoniously stepped out to address his slaves. Each blow was liberating, it was like unshaking proof of the great lie of God’s existence.
Juhani Peltonen
Sometimes people are very predictable: they want a kitten in June, for example, and come the first of September they want someone to drown their cat. So someone does. But other times, people have dreams and things they want they can keep. Eriksson was the man who fulfilled these dreams. No one knew exactly what he found for himself along the way - probably a lot less than people thought. But he went on doing it anyway, perhaps for the sake of the search.
Tove Jansson
Being who you are for ever is the price you pay for im­mor­tal­ity.
Hannu Rajaniemi
Silence is not empty or immaterial, and it is not needed to chain tame things. It often guards powers strong enough to shatter everything.
Emmi Itäranta
Of all silences I had encountered this was the gravest and most inevitable: not the silence of secrets, but of knowing.
Emmi Itäranta
Someone who eats pancakes and jam can't be so awfully dangerous. You can talk to him.
Tove Jansson
There's no need to kick him in the balls for him to tell the story honestly and impartially, because the dead are usually honest, even the bastards among them.
Hassan Blasim
It seemed as if at least a moment some spring had burst forth in his barren soul.
Väinö Linna
Thingumy whispered something again. The Hemulen nodded. "It's a secret," he said. "Thingumy and Bob think the Contents is the most beautiful thing in the world, but the Groke just thinks it's the most expensive."The Snork nodded many times and wrinkled his forehead. "This is a difficult case," he said. Thingumy and Bob have reasoned correctly, but they have acted wrongly. Right is right.
Tove Jansson
Thingumy and Bob sighed contentedly and settled down to contemplate the precious stone. They stared in silent rapture at it.The ruby changed colour all the time. At first it was quite pale, and then suddenly a pink glow would flow over it like sunrise on a snow capped mountain -- and then again crimson flames shot out of its heart and it seemed like a great black tulip with stamens on fire.
Tove Jansson
The hemulen woke up slowly and recognised himself and wished he had been someone he didn't know.
Tove Jansson
The Swedes have coined the term 'management by perkele' to portray the Finnish managerial approach. Instead of collectively pondering all the possible alternatives and letting every member of the staff from the cleaner to the MD voice their views, as the Swedes do, the Finns act swiftly and don't waste time on the decision-making process. If something isn't happening quickly enough, it is necessary for the top managers to slam their fists on the table and yell, 'Perkele!' Repeatedly, if necessary.
Tarja Moles
Really good films don't diminish anything, they don't close things off. On the contrary, they open up new insights, they make new thoughts thinkable. They crowd us, they deflate our slovenly lifestyle, our thoughtless way of chattering and pissing away our time and energy and passion. Believe me, films can teach us a huge amount. And they give us a true picture of the way life is."Mari laughed. "Of our slovenly lifestyle, you mean? You mean, maybe they teach us to piss our lives away with a little more intelligence, a little more elegance?
Tove Jansson
Don’t stay with someone who drives you crazy. Find someone who keeps you sane.
Michael Monroe
Well, for one, you walk around like you’re so much better than everyone else. We’re all a bunch of soulless animals or somethin’ in your eyes, I guess. You’re the high and mighty one and I ain’t fit to drink your piss.
Michael Monroe
We don’t want our politicians bending to the whims of whichever corporation has the money to pay them off.
Michael Monroe
People didn’t love all of this when they still had it. If you love something, you do what’s best for it. You don’t destroy it.
Michael Monroe
Well one tiny poisonous spider can kill a very large man if it bites him in the right place.
Michael Monroe
The storage capacity of the average human brain is two-hundred and fifty-six exabytes. However, the average adult human only uses approximately one billionth of that storage space effectively. This means my knowledge capacity is approximately three thousand trillion times that of your average human.
Michael Monroe
A leader’s first duty is to look after his or her people, especially those who are sick, hungry, or thirsty.
Michael Monroe
Ask very pointed questions. Sharp as sword blades, or laser blasts, if you catch my meaning.
Michael Monroe
That’s what you people do, isn’t it? Make assumptions and sell them to impressionable idiots.
Michael Monroe
Money is a tool we use to reach certain ends. Nothing more, nothing less. It’s hard to come by, though, so when opportunities arise, we need to make the most of them.
Michael Monroe
We need to keep government small, but we also need to keep the influence of big business small, and we need to keep the power in the hands of the people, where it belongs. Big government and big business aren’t the only two alternatives.
Michael Monroe
That was a double negative, Jemail. By saying that you haven’t seen nobody, you’re actually saying that you have seen somebody.
Michael Monroe
Let them come. We’ve got helicopters, tanks, jets, and big guns. We’ve got armies of robots. What do they have but their stench and the squalor they live in?
Michael Monroe
There’s a big difference between being numb to something and being immune to it.
Michael Monroe
Well you know what they say. It’s always raining somewhere.
Michael Monroe
You’ll find a way. You’ll always find a way. And on the rare occasions when you can’t, you’ll have friends who will.
Michael Monroe
Humans have been doin’ awful things to each other throughout history. Humanity’s not as great as you make it out to be. I do what needs to be done, and that’s that. We’re about to go to war, Earl. There ain’t no humanity in war.
Michael Monroe
We all end up dying in the end. It’s just a question of how and when.
Michael Monroe
As far as I know, there’s nothing more dangerous than a man who doesn’t care if he lives or dies.
Michael Monroe
A good friend is someone who gets ya drunk and then walks ya home afterwards.
Michael Monroe
Everyone has the right to believe whatever he or she wants. Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Pagans, atheitsts, and every other religion. People can follow whichever they choose. Even if you and I believe Christianity is the truth, we must allow others to choose their own beliefs. You can’t force anyone to believe something they don’t, anyway.
Michael Monroe
Our world must be hell, then. It must be the hell of some other place where all of us committed atrocious sins of some sort, and now we’re stuck here until we die and either come back or are whisked off to some other hell. It couldn’t be worse than this one, though.
Michael Monroe
He could argue a case for anything, but that doesn’t change the fact he’s wrong most of the time.
Michael Monroe
If the only option you leave poor people with is to resort to violence in order to survive, they’ll do just that. And there are lots more poor people in this world than there are rich ones.
Michael Monroe
A joke is a witticism or play on words that’s meant to be funny. I say ‘meant to be’ because most jokes aren’t funny. They range between mildly amusing and grimace-inducingly annoying.
Michael Monroe
You shouldn’t say mean things to people before they kill you. It’s being a sore loser.
Michael Monroe
Increasing knowledge lessens the sphere of the supernatural.
Edvard Westermarck
But when people understand one another without speaking, it can often leave them with very little to talk about, don’t you think?
Tove Jansson
Are writers the torchbearers of humanity? It’s a romantic idea, but it’s complete rubbish. We writers are the crocodiles in the river.
Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen
I would be happy to take credit for all of the wonderful experiences I describe in my novels, but my life isn’t quite that rich. Unfortunately we authors are sometimes forced to use other people’s lives, too.”“Sounds rather beastly,” the journalist laughed. “Or maybe writers are like vultures. Some people feel we journalists are.” He mimicked a bird of prey and grinned.
Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen
Even the best cook can’t make chicken soup out of his own feet. There aren’t so terribly many ingredients in anyone’s life, less meat than there is on a sparrow. The average person could come up with at most two good novels. Many who think very highly of themselves can’t manage more than a couple of anecdotes.
Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen
But water doesn't care for human sorrows. It flows without slowing or quickening its pace in the darkness of the earth, where only stones will hear.
Emmi Itäranta
Nothing can be as peaceful and endless as a long winter darkness, going on and on, like living in a tunnel where the dark sometimes deepens into night and sometimes eases to twilight, you're screened from everything, protected, even more alone than usual.
Tove Jansson
Sometimes it is necessary to step into darkness alone and find your way back. To carry something with you into light you could not have found anywhere else.
Emmi Itäranta