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Bohumil Hrabal Biography

Bohumil Hrabal (Czech pronunciation: [ˈboɦumɪl ˈɦrabal]; 28 March 1914 – 3 February 1997) was a Czech writer, regarded by many Czechs as one of the best writers of the 20th century.

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Bohumil Hrabal Quotes

He was a gentle and sensitive soul, and therefore had a short temper, which is why he went straight after everything with an ax.

Everything, Gentle, Sensitive, Soul, Temper

Lost in my dreams, I somehow cross at the traffic signals, bumping into street lamps or people, yet moving onward, exuding fumes of beer and grime, yet smiling, because my briefcase is full of books and that very night I expect them to tell me things about myself I don't know.

Book, Briefcase, Dream, Exuding, Moving, Tell

. . . because real thoughts come from outside and travel with us like the noodle soup we take to work; in other words, inquisitors burn books in vain. If a book has anything to say, it burns with a quiet laugh, because any book worth its salt points up and out of itself.

Book, Come, Laughing, Real, Soup, Take

As I helped him up, I felt him shake all over, so I asked him to forgive me, without knowing what for, but that was my lot, asking forgiveness, I even asked forgiveness of myself for being what I was, what it was my nature to be.

Asking, Felt, Forgive Me, Forgiving, Knowing, Shake

Because when I read, I don't really read; I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop, or I sip it like a liqeur until the thought dissolves in me like alcohol, infusing brain and heart and coursing on through the veins to the root of each blood vessel.

Beautiful, Blood, Coursing, Heart, Sentence

I always loved twilight: it was the only time of day I had the feeling that something important could happen. All things were more beautiful bathed in twilight, all streets, all squares, and all the people walking through them; I even had the feeling that I was a handsome young man, and I liked looking at myself in the mirror, watching myself in the shop windows as I strode along, and even when I touched my face, I felt no wrinkles at my mouth or forehead.

Beautiful, Day, Happen, Men, Squares, Twilight

No book worth its salt is meant to put you to sleep, it's meant to make you jump out of your bed in your underwear and run and beat the author's brains out.

Beat, Book, Jump, Running, Underwear, Writing

I pop a beautiful sentence into my mouth and suck it like a fruit drop.

Beautiful, Fruit, Like, Mouths, Pop, Sentence

I can be by myself because I'm never lonely, I'm simply alone, living in my heavily populated solitude, a harum-scarum of infinity and eternity, and Infinity and Eternity seem to take a liking to the likes of me.

Heavily, Likes, Lonely, Populated, Solitude

Today's Gypsies, who have lived in Prague for only two generations, light a ritual fire wherever they work, a nomads' fire crackling only for the joy of it, a blaze of rough-hewn wood like a child's laugh, a symbol of the eternity that preceded human thought, a free fire, a gift from heaven, a living sign of the elements unnoticed by the world-weary pedestrian, a fire in the ditches of Prague warming the wanderer's eye and soul.

Children, Eye, Lived, Prague, Two, Wherever

I was always lucky in my bad luck.

Bad, Bad Luck, Luck, Lucky

To spend our days betting on three-legged horses with beautiful names

Beautiful, Betting, Days, Horse, Names

I expect them to tell me things about myself I don't know.

Briefcases, Expect, Grime, Know, Knows, Things

And so everything I see in this world, it all moves backward and forward at the same time, like a black-smith's bellows, like everything in my press, turning into its opposite at the command of the red and green buttons, and that's what makes the world go round.

Black, Command, Moving, Opposite, Opposites, Press

It's interesting how young poets think of death while old fogies think of girls.

Fogies, Girl, Girls, Interesting, Think, Thinking

Bohumil Hrabal Biography

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