Michel Houellebecq - Quotes

If life is an illusion it's a pretty painful one.
Houellebecq, Michel.

...beds last on an average much longer than marriages...
Houellebecq, Michel.

The absence of the will to live is, alas, not sufficient to make one want to die.
Houellebecq, Michel.

Active people don't change the world profoundly, ideas do. Napoleon is less important to world history than Rousseau.
Houellebecq, Michel.

To give a man 5 sous because he is poor and has no bread is perfect, but to give him a blowjob because he has no girlfriend is too much of a good thing: you don't have to do that.
Houellebecq, Michel.

Actionists, beatniks, hippies, and serial killers were all pure libertarians who advanced the rights of the individual against social norms and against what they believed to be the hypocrisy of morality, sentiment, justice, and pity. Having exhausted the possibilities of sexual pleasure, it was reasonable that individuals should turn their attention to the wider pleasure of cruelty.
Houellebecq, Michel.

In a perfectly liberal sexual system, some people have an exciting erotic life; others are reduced to masturbation and solitude.
Houellebecq, Michel.

For me, everything is irreversible in the life of a society, as well as in individuals.
Houellebecq, Michel.

The traditional incoherence of the poet should not really be any more surprising than the old incoherence of the human race.
Houellebecq, Michel.

I tend to think that good and evil exist and that the quantity in each of us is unchangeable. The moral character of people is set, fixed until death. This resembles the Calvinist notion of predestination, in which people are born saved or damned, without being able to do a thing about it. And I am a curmudgeonly pain in the ass because I refuse to diverge from the scientific method or to believe there is a truth beyond science.
Houellebecq, Michel.

In France, there are two classic authors for children, Jules Verne and Alexandre Dumas. I always preferred Jules Verne. With Dumas, the whole historical thing bored me. Jules Verne had this exhaustive vision of the world that I liked. Everything in the world seemed to interest him. I was also very struck by the tales of Hans Christian Andersen. They upset me.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

I read Baudelaire oddly early, when I was about thirteen, but Pascal was the shock of my life. I was fifteen. I was on a class trip to Germany, my first trip abroad, and strangely I had brought the Pensées of Pascal. I was terrified by this passage: “Imagine a number of men in chains, all under sentence of death, some of whom are each day butchered in the sight of the others; those remaining see their own condition in that of their fellows, and looking at each other with grief and despair await their turn. This is an image of the human condition.” I think it affected me so deeply because I was raised by my grandparents. Suddenly I realized that they were going to die and probably soon. That’s when I discovered death.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

I think sometimes I need a break from reality. In my own writing, I think of myself as a realist who exaggerates a little.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

If not for science fiction, my biggest influences would all belong to the nineteenth century.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

Most people find Comte unreadable because he repeats himself to the point of madness. And medically speaking, he certainly wasn’t far from insanity. As far as I know, he is the only philosopher who tried to commit suicide. He threw himself into the Seine because of a broken heart. They pulled him out and he spent six months in a sanitorium. And this was the father of Positivism, which is considered to be the height of rationalism.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

There are too many answers. The first is that it’s well written. Another is that you sense obscurely that it’s the truth. Then there’s a third one, which is my favorite: because it’s intense. There is a need for intensity. From time to time, you have to forsake harmony. You even have to forsake truth. You have to, when you need to, energetically embrace excessive things. Now I sound like Saint Paul.
Houellebecq, Michel and Susannah Hunnewell (Interviewer). "Michel Houellebecq, The Art of Fiction." in: Paris Review. No. 206. No date.

I am creative because I am not happy, and it's a way of having control of situations. Situations may not be happy but I have a control of them, so it's different. I don't know if it's creative what I do, just to reconstructing life, I never have the impression that I am creating things. I have the impression that I am finding things which are all somewhere in me.
Houellebecq, Michel and Hermann Vaske (Interviewer). "Why Are You Creative." (Video). in: 2010Lab.tv. March 31, 2010.

[Q] Is it like an addiction to the creative process? [A] I think you need to create something when you want to make the world more simple. People like beauty ...but they like beauty because it's a special kind of flavor and they respect and give moment to artists because they can create beauty. That's the only thing artists can do. Because they have a special cyclical or neurotic complexion which can, which makes them able to create beauty.
Houellebecq, Michel and Hermann Vaske (Interviewer). "Why Are You Creative." (Video). in: 2010Lab.tv. March 31, 2010.

I am a solitary person but not very solitary so I don't need to be alone, it's a choice. Yes, if you want to be solitary, you have to write a book, the only way if you want to be creative and solitary.
Houellebecq, Michel and Hermann Vaske (Interviewer). "Why Are You Creative." (Video). in: 2010Lab.tv. March 31, 2010.

Life is painful and disappointing. It is useless, therefore, to write new realistic novels. We generally know where we stand in relation to reality and don’t care to know any more.
Houellebecq, Michel and Stephen King (Introduction). H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life. McSweeney. May 1, 2005. Paperback, 150 pages, Language English, ISBN: 1932416188.

Those who love life do not read. Nor do they go to the movies, actually. No matter what might be said, access to the artistic universe is more or less entirely the preserve of those who are a little fed up with the world.
Houellebecq, Michel and Stephen King (Introduction). H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life. McSweeney. May 1, 2005. Paperback, 150 pages, Language English, ISBN: 1932416188.

Quand on aime la vie, on ne lit pas.
Houellebecq, Michel and Stephen King (Introduction). H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life. McSweeney. May 1, 2005. Paperback, 150 pages, Language English, ISBN: 1932416188.

I don't begin by wanting to be provocative exactly, no. But when I realise that what I say is provoking, I don't change it because of obstinacy. It's up to me. Nobody asked me to say it again.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

I was talking about the stupidity of all monotheistic religions. And I explained that there is no clear relationship between Muslims and Arabs. That is something that's very obvious in France. Most Arabs can't be considered Muslims any more. They stop practising very quickly ... many come to avoid a Muslim country. It's very hard to meet an Arab who refuses a drink. It's very difficult to meet a virgin Arab girl at the moment of her marriage in France. They behave more or less as other French in this respect.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

The more I tell things, the more I forget and remember only the stories. But really I don't remember many things. Most of the time you are just persuading yourself of things.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

I was protected by the bigger children. I saw that it was hard and that there were only two possibilities: to be strong or to find a protector.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

...but I am clever, I am good at feeling and avoiding dangerous situations, and in most cases that can be enough.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

[SM] Broadly we agree on the first and last. Childhood should be great, and children are amazing. [MH] It astounds me their ability to endure. They are very resistant, very courageous, rarely unhappy, not frightened. That's something you lose. I don't know why. Adults are more fragile." The more we learn, he says, the more closed we become. "We are constantly stripping away to survive. There is no doubt. We become more and more cowardly.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

[SM]Alcohol is a great palliative. There are many reasons to drink. [MH]To rest. When you are mentally agitated, it calms you. When you are shy it helps you to socialise. And it destroys anxiety. It also can give you the impression of being brilliant and being brave. So it has a lot of uses.
Houellebecq, Michel and Suzie Mackenzie (Interviewer). "Interview." in: The Guardian. August 31, 2002. (English).

People often say that the English are very cold fish, very reserved, that they have a way of looking at things – even tragedy – with a sense of irony. There’s some truth in it; it’s pretty stupid of them, though. Humor won’t save you; it doesn’t really do anything at all. You can look at life ironically for years, maybe decades; there are people who seem to go through most of their lives seeing the funny side, but in the end, life always breaks your heart. Doesn’t matter how brave you are, how reserved, or how much you’ve developed a sense of humor, you still end up with your heart broken. That’s when you stop laughing. In the end there’s just the cold, the silence and the loneliness. In the end, there’s only death.
Houellebecq, Michel and Frank Wynne (Translation) The Elementary Particles. Alfred A. Knopf. 2000. Hardcover, 320 pages, Language English, ISBN: 0375407707.

Love binds, and it binds forever. Good binds while evil unravels. Separation is another word for evil; it is also another word for deceit.
Houellebecq, Michel and Frank Wynne (Translation) The Elementary Particles. Alfred A. Knopf. 2000. Hardcover, 320 pages, Language English, ISBN: 0375407707.

The world outside had its own rules, and those rules were not human.
Houellebecq, Michel and Frank Wynne (Translation) The Elementary Particles. Alfred A. Knopf. 2000. Hardcover, 320 pages, Language English, ISBN: 0375407707.

Later Michel went up to the priest as he was packing away the tools of the trade. “I was very interested in what you were saying earlier…” The man of God smiled urbanely, then Michel began to talk about the Aspect experiments and the EPR paradox: how two particle, once united, are forever and inseparable whole, “which seems pretty much in keeping with what you were saying about one flesh.” The priest’s smile froze slightly. “What I’m trying to say, “Michel went on enthusiastically, “is that from an ontological point of view, the pair can be assigned a single vector in Hilbert space. Do you see what I mean?
Houellebecq, Michel and Frank Wynne (Translation) The Elementary Particles. Alfred A. Knopf. 2000. Hardcover, 320 pages, Language English, ISBN: 0375407707.

Rumor had it that he was homosexual; in reality, in recent years, he was simply a garden-variety alcoholic.
Houellebecq, Michel and Frank Wynne (Translation) The Elementary Particles. Alfred A. Knopf. 2000. Hardcover, 320 pages, Language English, ISBN: 0375407707.

That same evening he came across a photo taken of him at his old primary school, in Charny, and he began to weep. Seated at his desk, the child held a school book open in his hands. He was looking straight at the camera and smiling, spirited and full of joy, and what seemed incomprehensible was that this child was him. This child did his homework, learned his lessons earnestly, confidently. He was entering the world, discovering the world, and the world did not make him afraid. He was all ready to take his place in the society of men. All that, you could see it all in the child’s eyes... Time is a banal mystery, he tried to tell himself, and it was only natural. The light in his eyes went out, the joy and the confidence faded away.
Houellebecq, Michel. Les particules élémentaires. 1998.

It’s still the same light, in the morning, which sets in and grows, Yet the world, perceived by two, has a completely different meaning. I don’t know anymore whether this is love or revolutionary action...
Houellebecq, Michel. Le Sens du combat. 1996.

We yearn for something resembling fidelity, Like an intertwining of sweet dependencies, Something which surpasses and contains existence; We can no longer live far from eternity.
Houellebecq, Michel. La poursuite du bonheur. 1992.

I’m a child who no longer has the right to tears.
Houellebecq, Michel. La poursuite du bonheur. 1992.