Mario Benedetti Quotes

My first two books did nada. I ended up paying the publishers.

I do not write for the reader to come, but for him who is here, short of reading the text on my shoulder.

We are born sad and we die sad, but meanwhile we love bodies whose sad beauty is a miracle.

When I have worries, fears or a love affair, I have the luck of being able to transform it into a poem.

Five minutes are enough to dream a whole life, that is how relative time is.

Perfection is a polished collection of errors.

Generosity is the only legitimate selfishness.

The real influence on my work was reality, that of my country and Latin America in general.

After all Death is a Symbol that there was Life.

An intellectuals weapon is writing, but sometimes people react as if it were a firearm. A writer can do a lot to change the situation, but as far as I know, no dictatorship has fallen because of a sonnet.

I think the only positive thing that came from Uruguays dictatorship was the spread of Montevideo natives around the world, and I continued writing about them from my various places of exile.