Karl Kraus Quotes

What the teachers digest, the pupils eat.

Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country.

I can say with pride that I have spent days and nights not reading anything, and that with unflagging energy I use every moment toacquire gradually an encyclopedic lack of education.

A historian is often only a journalist facing backwards.

Education is what most receive, many pass on, and few possess.

To me all men are equal: there are jackasses everywhere, and I have the same contempt for them all.

I like to hold a monologue with women. But a dialogue with myself is more stimulating.

Sound opinions are valueless. What matters is who holds them.

I and my public understand each other very well: it does not hear what I say, and I don't say what it wants to hear.

Children play soldier. That makes sense. But why do soldiers play children?

Many share my views with me. But I don't share them with them.

Diplomacy is a game of chess in which the nations are checkmated.

Most critics write critiques which are by the authors they write critiques about. That would not be so bad, but then most authorswrite works which are by the critics who write critiques about them.

Love thy neighbor as thyself. Because each of us is his own neighbor.

Through my satire I make little people so big that afterwards they are worthy objects of my satire and no one can reproach me any longer.

No ideas and the ability to express them - that's a journalist.

Nothing is more horrible than my self in the mirror of hysteria. Nothing is more vulgar than my style in the hands of another. Toimitate me is to punish me.

The triumph of morality: A thief who has broken into a bedroom claims his sense of shame had been outraged, and by threatening theoccupants with exposure of an immoral act he blackmails them into not bringing charges for burglary.

When I don't make any progress, it is because I have bumped into the wall of language. Then I draw back with a bloody head. And would like to go on.

If by day art is in the service of business, the evenings are devoted to the businessman's enjoyment of it. That is asking a lot of art, but art and the businessman make it work.

Psychoanalysts are father confessors who like to listen to the sins of the father as well.

One cannot dictate an aphorism to a typist. It would take too long.

The art of an actress is sublimated sexuality. But off the stage the fire must be able to reconvert the steam into body.

Family life is an encroachment on private life.

Many desire to kill me, and many wish to spend an hour chatting with me. The law protects me from the former.

The ultimate aim of psychoanalysis is to attribute art to mental weakness, and then to trace the weakness back to the point where, according to analytic dogma, it originated namely, the lavatory.

There is a cultural taste which tries very hard to get rid of the lice in a fur coat. There is another which tolerates the lice and thinks the coat can be worn with them in it. And finally there is a taste which regards the lice as the most important thing about the coat and consequently places the coat at the lice's disposal.

That an author takes a bow is not humility but presumption. What does the paleface want on the stage afterwards? But before the performance he had even less business there--and paying him royalties is equivalent to cheating the actors.

To be sure, the dog is loyal. But why, on that account, should we take him as an example? He is loyal to man, not to other dogs.

One must read all writers twice--the good as well as the bad. The one kind will be recognized; the other, unmasked.

Technology is a servant who makes so much noise cleaning up in the next room that his master cannot make music.

How do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists, then believe what they read.

The mission of the press is to spread culture while destroying the attention span.

A snob is unreliable. The work he praises might just be good.

Insights into erotic life belong to art, not education. But sometimes these have to be spelled out for the illiterates. And it ismainly a matter of convincing the illiterates, for they are the ones who write the penal code.

They judge lest they be judged.

Many women would like to dream with men without sleeping with them. Someone should point out to them that this is utterly impossible.

Satire chooses and knows no objects. It arises by fleeing from them and their forcing themselves upon it.

I have to do this, as long as it is at all possible; for if those who are obliged to look after commas had always made sure they were in the right place, then Shanghai would not be burning.

A school without grades must have been concocted by someone who was drunk on non-alcoholic wine.

Moral responsibility is what is lacking in a man when he demands it of a woman.

He who does without the praise of the crowd will not deny himself an opportunity to be his own adherent.

The extraordinary ability of a woman to forget is not the same as the talent of a lady not to be able to remember.

Ingratitude is often disproportionate to the benefaction received.

The devil is an optimist if he thinks he can make people worse than they are.

An idea's birth is legitimate if one has the feeling that one is catching oneself plagiarizing oneself.

Sexuality poorly repressed unsettles some families; well repressed, it unsettles the whole world.

If someone calls me vain and mean, I know that he trusts me and has something to confess to me.