Karen Blixen quotes - page 2

The entire being of a woman is a secret which should be kept. (Karen Blixen)
Human talk is a centrifugal function, ever in flight outwards from what is on the talker's mind. View quote
Karen Blixen
Africa, amongst the continents, will teach it to you: that God and the Devil are one, the majesty coeternal, not two uncreated but one uncreated, and the Natives neither confounded the persons nor divided the substance. View quote
Karen Blixen
During the first quarter of the last century, seaside resorts became the fashion, even in those countries of Northern Europe within the minds of whose people the sea had hitherto held the role of the devil, the cold and voracious hereditary foe of humanity. View quote
Karen Blixen
I think it will be truly glorious when women become real people and have the whole world open to them. View quote
Karen Blixen
Love, with very young people, is a heartless business. We drink at that age from thirst, or to get drunk; it is only later in life that we occupy ourselves with the individuality of our wine. View quote
Karen Blixen
Who tells a finer tale than any of us. Silence does. View quote
Karen Blixen
I had a farm in Africa, at the foot of the Ngong Hills. View quote
Karen Blixen
Where the storyteller is loyal, eternally and unswervingly loyal to the story, there, in the end, silence will speak. Where the story has been betrayed, silence is but emptiness. But we, the faithful, when we have spoken our last word, will hear the voice of silence. View quote
Karen Blixen
It's an odd feeling-farewell-there is some envy in it. Men go off to be tested for courage and if we're tested at all, it's for patience, for doing without, for how well we can endure loneliness. View quote
Karen Blixen
our longing is our pledge, and blessed are the homesick, for they shall come home. (Karen Blixen)
One does not travel by plane. One is merely sent, like a parcel. View quote
Karen Blixen
I first began to tell tales to delight the world and make it wiser... View quote
Karen Blixen
Write a little every day, without hope, without despair. View quote
Karen Blixen
I think Marilyn is bound to make an almost overwhelming impression on the people who meet her for the first time. It is not that she is pretty, although she is of course almost incredibly pretty, but she radiates, at the same time, unbounded vitality and a kind of unbelievable innocence. I have met the same in a lion-cub, which my native servants in Africa brought me. I would not keep her, since I felt that it would in some way be wrong...I shall never forget the almost overpowering feeling of unconquerable strength and sweetness which she conveyed. I had all the wild nature of Africa amicably gazing at me with mighty playfulness. View quote
Karen Blixen
If I know a song of Africa, of the giraffe and the African new moon lying on her back, of the plows in the fields and the sweaty faces of the coffee pickers, does Africa know a song of me? Will the air over the plain quiver with a color that I have had on, or the children invent a game in which my name is, or the full moon throw a shadow over the gravel of the drive that was like me, or will the eagles of the Ngong Hills look out for me? View quote
Karen Blixen
We must leave our mark on life while we have it in our power. View quote
Karen Blixen
There is a particular hapiness in giving a man whom you like very much, good food that you have cooked yourself. View quote
Karen Blixen
No domestic animal can be as still as a wild animal. The civilized people have lost the aptitude of stillness, and must take lessons in silence from the wild before they are accepted by it. View quote
Karen Blixen
Here I am, where I ought to be. View quote
Karen Blixen
White people, who for a long time live alone with Natives, get into the habit of saying what they mean, because they have no reason or opportunity for dissimulation, and when they meet again their conversation keeps the Native tone. (Karen Blixen)
It never has happened, and it never will happen, and that is why it is told. View quote
Karen Blixen
In a foreign country and with foreign species of life one should take measures to find out whether things will be keeping their value when dead. To settlers I give this advice: "For the sake of your eyes and hearts, shoot not the Iguana." View quote
Karen Blixen
Love, with very young people, is a heartless business. We drink at that age from thirst, or to get drunk; it is only later in life that we occupy ourselves with the individuality of our wine. A young man in love is essentially enraptured by the forces within himself. View quote
Karen Blixen
Are you sure,' she asked, 'that it is God whom you serve?' The Cardinal looked up, met her eyes and smiled very gently. 'That,' he said, 'that, Madame, is a risk which the artists and the priests of this world have to run! View quote
Karen Blixen