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Death is a terrible provocation. It appears almost everywhere, presenting a stern but effective scale for both values and ethical standards.

— Peter Wessel Zapffe The Humorous Pessimist (1990)

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Death

More quotes by Peter Wessel Zapffe

Each new generation asks – What is the meaning of life? A more fertile way of putting the question would be – Why does man need a meaning to life?

The Humorous Pessimist (1990)

To bear children into this world is like carrying wood into a burning house.

No future triumph or metamorphosis can justify the pitiful blighting of a human being against his will.

For me, a desert island is no tragedy, neither is a deserted planet.

The seed of a metaphysical or religious defeat is in us all. For the honest questioner, however, who doesn’t seek refuge in some faith or fantasy, there will never be an answer.

The Humorous Pessimist (1990)

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To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear life are already three parts dead.

Bertrand Russell Marriage and Morals (1929)

The most important thing I learned on Tralfamadore was that when a person dies he only appears to die.

Kurt Vonnegut Slaughterhouse-Five (1969)

The thunderstorm is a constant phenomenon, raging alternately over some part of the world or the other. Can a single man or creature escape death if all that charge of lightning strikes the earth?

Kalki Krishnamurthy Sivakozhundu of Tiruvazhundur (1939)

So what if a kid dies? God will take care of him.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Peter Wessel Zapffe (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.