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Quotes from Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) — Halldór Laxness

1902–1998 Iceland

← All quotes by Halldór Laxness

12 quotes

Isn't it funny how everyone manages to die except me?

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

"Oh, well, I'm leaving here now," he told her. "They're forcing me to sell up."

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

A man is not independent unless he has the courage to stand alone.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

People who like to display complicated technique in their verse are more given to pride themselves on their work than are those who write for their own solace.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

My children have never brought any shame upon their father. They have been independent children, my children.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

It's a useful habit to never believe more than half of what people tell you, and not to concern yourself with the rest. Rather keep your mind free and your path your own.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

Slowly, slowly winter day opens his arctic eye.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

Never did these thanes of hell escape their just deserts.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

His mother taught him to sing. And when he had grown up and had listened to the world's song, he felt that there could be no greater happiness than to return to her song. In her song dwelt the most precious and most incomprehensible dreams of mankind.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

The most remarkable thing about man's dreams is that they all come true; this has always been the case, though no one would care to admit it.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

Never do hymns seem so long as in the days of childhood, never is their world and their language so alien to the soul. In old age the opposite is true, the hours are then too short for the hymns.

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

He wandered away, weeping, away from the farm and up to the rocks at the foot of the mountain, quite overpowered by the evil that seems so often to prevail in life and even to rule it. But what do you think he heard from the rocks at the foot of the mountain? Why, he heard the most delightful singing!

Sjálfstætt fólk (Independent People) (1935)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Halldór Laxness (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.