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34 Quotes By Mario Vargas Llosa, The Recipient Of Nobel Prize In Literature

Famous As: Latin America's Most Significant Novelist and Essayist and Winner of 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature
Born On: March 28, 1936
Born In: Arequipa, Peru
Founder / Co Founder: Democratic Front
Age: 88 Years
Mario Vargas Llosa is an acclaimed writer, essayist, college professor, journalist and a recipient of Nobel Prize in Literature. Vargas Llosa learned to read at the age of 5, and says that reading paved his way towards writing. In 1952, his work ‘The Flight of the Inca’, was enacted as a play, and that assured his future in literature. To study law and literature, he joined the University of San Marcos and graduated in 1958. He went to Spain on a scholarship from ‘The Complutense University of Madrid’, and completed his doctorate in philosophy. He shot to fame with his novels like ‘The Green House’, ‘Conversation in the Cathedral’ and ‘The Time of the Hero’. During his time in France, he met other Latin American poets and along with them he contributed to the ‘Latin American boom’. Many of his words, speeches or communication to his friends or students have become popular quotes and these thoughts cover a wide range of topics. Here are a few thoughts, sayings and quotes from the life of this living legend that are sure to fill your life with rainbow colors!
One can't fight with oneself, for this battle has only one loser.

One can't fight with oneself, for this battle has only one loser.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Almost seventy years later I remember clearly how the magic of translating the words in books into images enriched my life, breaking the barriers of time and space...

Almost seventy years later I remember clearly how the magic of translating the words in books into images enriched my life, breaking the barriers of time and space...

Mario Vargas Llosa
Memory is a snare, pure and simple; it alters, it subtly rearranges the past to fit the present.

Memory is a snare, pure and simple; it alters, it subtly rearranges the past to fit the present.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Writers are the exorcists of their own demons.

Writers are the exorcists of their own demons.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Its easy to know what you want to say, but not to say it

Its easy to know what you want to say, but not to say it

Mario Vargas Llosa
But what do I have? The things I'm told and the things I tell, that's all. And as far as I know, that never yet made anyone fly.

But what do I have? The things I'm told and the things I tell, that's all. And as far as I know, that never yet made anyone fly.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Life is a shitstorm, in which art is our only umbrella.

Life is a shitstorm, in which art is our only umbrella." (spoken by character in a novel by Mario Vargas Llosa)

Mario Vargas Llosa
I convinced her that her first loyalty isn't to other people, but to her own feelings.

I convinced her that her first loyalty isn't to other people, but to her own feelings.

Mario Vargas Llosa
You cannot teach creativity—how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.” Mario Vargas Llosa

You cannot teach creativity—how to become a good writer. But you can help a young writer discover within himself what kind of writer he would like to be.” Mario Vargas Llosa

Mario Vargas Llosa
Science is still only a candle glimmering in a great pitch-dark cavern.

Science is still only a candle glimmering in a great pitch-dark cavern.

Mario Vargas Llosa
No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

No matter how ephemeral it is, a novel is something, while despair is nothing.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Death isn't enough. It doesn't remove the stain. But a slap, a whiplash, square on the face, does. Because a man's face is as sacred as his mother or his wife.

Death isn't enough. It doesn't remove the stain. But a slap, a whiplash, square on the face, does. Because a man's face is as sacred as his mother or his wife.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Revolution will free society of its afflictions, while science will free the individual of his.

Revolution will free society of its afflictions, while science will free the individual of his.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Well, at heart I knew she'd never be a normal woman. And I didn't want her to be one, because what I loved in her were the indomitable and unpredictable aspects of her personality

Well, at heart I knew she'd never be a normal woman. And I didn't want her to be one, because what I loved in her were the indomitable and unpredictable aspects of her personality

Mario Vargas Llosa
Writing fiction is the best thing there is because absolutely everything is possible!

Writing fiction is the best thing there is because absolutely everything is possible!

Mario Vargas Llosa
It is rare and almost impossible for a novel to have only one narrator.

It is rare and almost impossible for a novel to have only one narrator.

Mario Vargas Llosa
I was very young and lived with my grandparents in a villa with white walls in the Calle Ocharan, in Miraflores.

I was very young and lived with my grandparents in a villa with white walls in the Calle Ocharan, in Miraflores.

Mario Vargas Llosa
I am somewhat allergic to explanations that divide men and women into frozen categories and attribute to each sex its characteristic virtues and shortcomings.

I am somewhat allergic to explanations that divide men and women into frozen categories and attribute to each sex its characteristic virtues and shortcomings.

Mario Vargas Llosa
He was a man in the prime of his life, his fifties...broad forehead, aquiline nose, penetrating gaze, the very soul of rectitude and goodness.

He was a man in the prime of his life, his fifties...broad forehead, aquiline nose, penetrating gaze, the very soul of rectitude and goodness.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Living is worth the effort if only because without life we could not read or imagine stories.

Living is worth the effort if only because without life we could not read or imagine stories.

Mario Vargas Llosa
We invent fictions in order to live somehow the many lives we would like to lead when we barely have one at our disposal.

We invent fictions in order to live somehow the many lives we would like to lead when we barely have one at our disposal.

Mario Vargas Llosa
It's easier to imagine the death of one person than those of a hundred or a thousand. When multiplied, suffering becomes abstract. It's not easy to be moved by abstract things.

It's easier to imagine the death of one person than those of a hundred or a thousand. When multiplied, suffering becomes abstract. It's not easy to be moved by abstract things.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Because of literature we can decipher, at least partially, the hieroglyphic that existence tends to be for the great majority of human beings.

Because of literature we can decipher, at least partially, the hieroglyphic that existence tends to be for the great majority of human beings.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Porque a felicidade era temporária, individual, excepcionalmente dual, raríssimas vezes tripartida e nunca coletiva, municipal.

Porque a felicidade era temporária, individual, excepcionalmente dual, raríssimas vezes tripartida e nunca coletiva, municipal.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Instead of speaking of justice and injustice, freedom and oppression, classless society and class society, they talked in terms of God and the Devil.

Instead of speaking of justice and injustice, freedom and oppression, classless society and class society, they talked in terms of God and the Devil.

Mario Vargas Llosa
One of the most damaging myths of our time is that poor countries live in poverty because of a conspiracy of the rich countries, who arrange things so as to keep them underdeveloped, in order to exploit them.

One of the most damaging myths of our time is that poor countries live in poverty because of a conspiracy of the rich countries, who arrange things so as to keep them underdeveloped, in order to exploit them.

Mario Vargas Llosa
They had forgotten the abuses, the murders, the corruption, the spying, the isolation, the fear: horror had become myth. Everybody had jobs and there wasn't so much crime.

They had forgotten the abuses, the murders, the corruption, the spying, the isolation, the fear: horror had become myth. Everybody had jobs and there wasn't so much crime.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Their curses were not aimed at any definite target: they swore at such abstractions as God, the Officers, the Mothers of Others, with more music than meaning.

Their curses were not aimed at any definite target: they swore at such abstractions as God, the Officers, the Mothers of Others, with more music than meaning.

Mario Vargas Llosa
Because happiness was temporal, individual, in exceptional circumstances twofold, on extremely rare occasions tripartite, and never collective, civic.

Because happiness was temporal, individual, in exceptional circumstances twofold, on extremely rare occasions tripartite, and never collective, civic.

Mario Vargas Llosa