Orhan Pamuk Quotes

Enjoyment of football is part of the social context, and I have lost my faith in this social context.

Where there is true art and genuine virtuosity the artist can paint an incomparable masterpiece without leaving even a trace of his identity.

Snow reminds Ka of God! But I’m not sure it would be accurate. What brings me close to God is the silence of snow.

Love is a sacred silence.

A writer in someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second being inside him, and the world that makes him who he is.

National consciousness is truly a miraculous thing. When I am not in Turkey I feel even more Turkish than in Istanbul. But when I'm home my European side becomes more apparent.

The secularists in Turkey haven't underestimated religion, they just made the mistake of believing they could control it with the power of the army alone.

When you love a city and have explored it frequently on foot, your body, not to mention your soul, gets to know the streets so well after a number of years that in a fit of melancholy, perhaps stirred by a light snow falling ever so sorrowfully, you'll discover your legs carrying you of their own accord toward one of your favourite promontories

When you look into the faces of these quiet creatures who don't know how to tell stories--who are mute, who can't make themselves heard, who fade into the woodwork, who only think of the perfect answer after the fact, after they're back at home, who can never think of a story that anyone else will find interesting--is there not more depth and more meaning in them? You can see every letter of every untold story swimming on their faces, and all the signs of silence, dejection, and even defeat. You can even imagine your own face in those faces, can't you?

The silence of snow, thought the man sitting just behind the bus driver.

My religion is complicated. Literature is my true religion. After all, I come from a completely non-religious family.

Yet does illustrating in a new way signify a new way of seeing?

The urbanized life has lead to the destruction of the legends.

I want to describe the psychological state of the people in a certain city.

Books, which we mistake for consolation, only add depth to our sorrow.

Writing my own diary is the best form of remembrance, but only for my own use. I need these notes; it's like an impulse.

For if a lover's face survives emblazoned on your heart, the world is still your home.

There's a lot of pride involved in my refusal to believe in god.

The entire world was like a palace with countless rooms whose doors opened into one another. We were able to pass from one room to the next only by exercising our memories and imaginations, but most of us, in our laziness, rarely exercised these capacities, and forever remained in the same room.

We're not stupid! We're just poor! And we have a right to insist on this distinction

Age had not made him less handsome, as is so often the case; it had simply made him less visible.

[N]othing is as surprising as life. Except for writing. Except for writing. Yes, of course, except for writing, the only consolation.

Over time, I have come to see the work of literature less as narrating the world than "seeing the world with words." From the moment he begins to use words like colors in a painting, a writer can begin to see how wondrous and surprising the world is, and he breaks the bones of language to find his own voice. For this he needs paper, a pen, and the optimism of a child looking at the world for the first time.

What is love?” “I don’t know.” “Love is the name given to the bond Kemal feels with Füsun whenever they travel along highways or sidewalks; visit houses, gardens, or rooms; or whenever he watches her sitting in tea gardens and restaurants, and at dinner tables.” “Hmmm … that’s a lovely answer,~ But isn’t love what you feel when you can’t see me?” “Under those circumstances, it becomes a terrible obsession, an illness.

Ka found it very soothing: for the first time in years, he felt part of a family. In spite of the trials and responsibilities of what was called 'family', he saw now the joys of its unyielding togetherness, and was sorry not to have known more of it in his life.

As always after drinking too much, I felt like my own ghost trying to take it's first solo walk outside the body.

The beauty and mystery of this world only emerges through affection, attention, interest and compassion . . . open your eyes wide and actually see this world by attending to its colors, details and irony.

I do not believe in a personal connection to God; that's where it gets transcendental.

I have hired a bodyguard, on the recommendation of my friends and the government. It's outrageous, having to live like this.

There's been quite a clear upswing in nationalist sentiments. Everyone is talking about it, in Turkey as well.

Turkish football serves the cause of nationalism, but not of the nation.

My childhood proved to me that there could be no enjoyment of football without community. But it becomes difficult when this community is having problems with its identity. That's when we experience all possible forms of nationalist exaggeration.

Let me first state forthright that contrary to what we've often read in books and heard from preachers, when you are a woman, you don't feel like the Devil.

Istanbul is certainly in the process of transforming itself into an attractive cultural, tourist and financial center. But there are also millions of sad stories in this giant sea of immigration, poverty, misery and contradictions. So much anger, frustration and fury.

A writer is someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second being inside him, and the world that makes him who he is: when I speak of writing, what comes first to my mind is not a novel, a poem, or literary tradition, it is a person who shuts himself up in a room, sits down at a table, and alone, turns inward; amid its shadows, he builds a new world with words.

The writers secret is not inspiration - for it is never clear where it comes from - it is his stubbornness, his patience.

The gap between compassion and surrender is love’s darkest, deepest region.

...a nation could change its way of life, its history, its technology, its art, literature, and culture, but it would never have a real chance to change its gestures.

My decision to view the world through novels, as it were, which is a typically European way of looking at things, became a heavy burden for me. But I took it on consciously, even though it was torture for me.

In his brilliant new book Pankaj Mishra reverses the long gaze of the West upon the East, showing modern history as it has been felt by the majority of the world's population from Turkey to China. These are the amazing stories of the grandfathers of today's angry Asians. Excellent!

Istanbul is a vast place. There are very conservative neighbourhoods, there are places that are upper class, Westernised, consuming Western culture.

To savour Istanbul's back streets, to appreciate the vines and trees that endow its ruins with accidental grace, you must, first and foremost, be a stranger to them.

In actuality, we don't look for smiles in pictures of bliss, but rather, for the happiness in life itself. Painters know this, but this is preciously what they cannot depict. That's why they substitute the joy of seeing for the joy of life.

How different from the cosy world of Rüya's detective novels, where authors never vexed a hero with more signs than he needed.

Sometimes I would see them not as mementos of the blissful hours but as the tangible precious debris of the storm raging in my soul.

I don't read newspapers in the morning. I take a look at the dailies in the afternoon, but only when I've finished my work for the day. Reading about what is happening in Turkey once again would only be demoralizing for me.

I identify with my culture, but I am happy to be living on a tolerant, intellectual island where I can deal with Dostoyevsky and Sartre, both great influences for me.

She looked out the window; in her eyes was the light that you see only in children arriving at a new place, or in young people still open to new influences, still curious about the world because they have not yet been scarred by life.