Six Characters in Search of an Author Quotes

“Life is full of strange absurdities, which, strangely enough, do not even need to appear plausible, since they are true.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“THE FATHER: But don't you see that the whole trouble lies here? In words, words. Each one of us has within him a whole world of things, each man of us his own special world. And how can we ever come to an understanding if I put in the words I utter the sense and value of things as I see them; while you who listen to me must inevitably translate them according to the conception of things each one of you has within himself. We think we understand each other, but we never really do.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“If only we could see in advance all the harm that can come from the good we think we are doing.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“For man never reasons so much and becomes so introspective as when he suffers ; since he is anxious to get at the cause of his sufferings, to learn who has produced them, and whether it is just or unjust that he should have to bear them. On the other hand, when he is happy, he takes his happiness as it comes and doesn't analyse it, just as if happiness were his right.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“We all have a world of things inside ourselves and each one of us has his own private world. How can we understand each other if the words I use have the sense and the value that I expect them to have, but whoever is listening to me inevitably thinks that those same words have a different sense and value, because of the private world he has inside himself, too.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“When a character is born, he acquires at once such an independence, even of his own author, that he can be imagined by everybody even in many other situations where the author never dreamed of placing him; and so he acquires for himself a meaning which the author never thought of giving him.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“I am an "unrealized" character, dramatically speaking...”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“But only in order to know if you, as you really are now, see yourself as you once were with all the illusions that were yours then, with all the things both inside and outside of you as they seemed to you - as they were then indeed for you. Well, sir, if you think of all those illusions that mean nothing to you now, of all those things which don't even seem to you to exist any more, while once they were for you, don't you feel that - I won't say these boards - but the very earth under your feet is sinking away from you when you reflect that in the same way this you as you feel it today - all this present reality of yours - is fated to seem a mere illusion to you tomorrow?”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Thus, sir, you see when faith is lacking, it becomes impossible to create certain states of happiness, for we lack the necessary humility. Vaingloriously, we try to substitute ourselves for this faith, creating thus for the rest of the world a reality which we believe after their fashion, while, actually, it doesn't exist.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“The man, the writer, the instrument of the creation will die, but his creation does not die.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“What is the stage? It's a place, baby, you know, where people play at being serious, a place where they act comedies. We've got to act a comedy now, dead serious.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“One gives way to the temptation, only to rise from it again, afterwards, with a great eagerness to reestablish one's dignity, as if it were a tombstone to place on the grave of one's shame, and a monument to hide and sign the memory of our weaknesses. Everybody's in the same case. Some folks haven't the courage to say certain things, that's all!

THE STEP-DAUGHTER: All appear to have the courage to do them though.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“وقتی شخصیتی آفریده می شود، بلافاصله از نویسنده خود فاصله می گیرد، مستقل می شود. بقیه می توانند او را در موقعیت های دیگری ببینند که نویسنده به فکرش نرسیده است. و در نتیجه "معنی" دیگری بدان داده می شود که نویسنده هرگز به عقلش نرسیده بوده است.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Why are you so anxious to destroy in the name of a vulgar, commonplace sense of truth, this reality which comes to birth attracted and formed by the magic of the stage itself, which has indeed more right to live here than you, since it is much truer than you -- if you don't mind my saying so?”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Un personaggio, signore, può sempre domandare a un uomo chi è. Perché un personaggio ha veramente una vita sua, segnata di caratteri suoi, per cui è sempre «qualcuno». Mentre un uomo – non dico lei, adesso – un uomo così in genere, può non essere «nessuno».”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Every true man, sir, who is a little above the level of the beasts and plants does not live for the sake of living, without knowing how to live; but he lives so as to give a meaning and a value of his own to life.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“For man never reasons so much and becomes so introspective as when he suffers;”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Nati vivi, volevano vivere.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore

“We want to live. THE MANAGER (ironically). For Eternity? THE FATHER No, sir, only for a moment... in you.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Nowhere! It is merely to show you that one is born to life in many forms, in many shapes, as tree, or as stone, as water, as butterfly, or as woman. So one may also be born a character in a play.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Because I suffer, sir! I'm not philosophizing: I'm crying aloud the reason of my sufferings. THE”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“But a fact is like a sack which won't stand up when it is empty. In order that it may stand up, one has to put into it the reason and sentiment which have caused it to exist.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“The manager: Do you understand?
Leading Man: I’m hanged if I do.
The Manager: Neither do I. But let’s get on
with it. It’s sure to be a glorious failure anyway.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Because a character has really a life of his own, marked with his especial characteristics; for which reason he is always “somebody.” But a man—I’m not speaking of you now—may very well be “nobody.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“But a fact is like a sack which won’t stand up when it is empty. In order that it may stand up, one has to put into it the reason and sentiment which have caused it to exist.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“But every man knows what unconfessable things pass within the secrecy of his own heart.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“But don’t you see that the whole trouble lies here. In words, words. Each one of us has within him a whole world of things, each man of us his own special world. And how can we ever come to an understanding if I put in the words I utter the sense and value of things as I see them; while you who listen to me must inevitably translate them according to the conception of things each one of you has within himself. We think we understand each other, but we never really do.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“Who was Sancho Panza? Who was Don Abbondio? Yet they live eternally because—live germs as they were—they had the fortune to find a fecundating matrix, a fantasy which could raise and nourish them: make them live for ever!”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“It is merely to show you that one is born to life in many forms, in many shapes, as tree, or as stone, as water, as butterfly, or as woman. So one may also be born a character in a play.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

“For man never reasons so much and becomes so introspective as when he suffers; since he is anxious to get at the cause of his sufferings, to learn who has produced them, and whether it is just or unjust that he should have to bear them.”
― Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author