Patrick Modiano Quotes
I write in the most classical French because this form is necessary for my novels: to translate the murky, floating, unsettling atmosphere I wanted them to have, I had to discipline it into the clearest, most traditional language possible.

Quotes to Explore
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Once Dwight Eisenhower makes up his mind, he's full of indecision.
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Through the history of rock n' roll, you see lots of bands making the mistake of putting on the tights when they get to arenas. Don't do that.
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Take a very small amount of money, your throwaway money, treat it as if it's already gone, you've mentally set it on fire, and put it in some distribution of a few truly legit layer 1 blockchains.
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Prison makes an interesting context for so many different characters to come together. You get to see what lines get drawn between people.
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I worked from 10 p.m. until 1 a.m. every night for a year to write the first 'Chicken Soup for the Soul' book.
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The humanitarian lays stress almost solely upon breadth of knowledge and sympathy.
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I grew up playing golf, and if I were ever good enough to play professionally, I would get to travel the world while playing a sport I love.
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Should the time come when the county family will be taken away, then the parish will feel for some time like a mouth from which a molar has been drawn - there will be a vacancy that will cause unrest and discomfort.
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Almost all the early Christian Fathers were opposed to the death penalty, even though it was of course standard practice across the ancient world.
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Always write as if you are talking to someone. It works. Don't put on any fancy phrases or accents or things you wouldn't say in real life.
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I'd love to do a movie like 'Bullitt.'
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Stardom happens - you can't plan it - it's destiny, and you shouldn't stand between you and your destiny. I'm letting my destiny play its part, and I go by my gut feeling. If I like my role, I say yes; if I don't, I just refuse, as simple as that.
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I may be wrong, but the essential illustrative nature of most documentary photography, and the worship of the object per se, in our best nature photography, is not enough to satisfy the man of today, compounded as he is of Christ, Freud, and Marx.
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I auditioned for 'The Office,' and I don't know if it was a role I could do, but I liked the character. You do one take, and you're reading with a person who's just sitting in a chair and not really... you're not playing off someone, which is what I like to do. I like to play around and find the moment.
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I feel quite safe and isolated in Germany. My wife is very well known there. But I am only looked at when I am holding her hand.
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I always say spend more on classics, like a good pair of leather trousers, an amazing tailored jacket, or a classic handbag. Then you can just mix your everyday tops from the high street.
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Conversion for me was not a Damascus Road experience. I slowly moved into an intellectual acceptance of what my intuition had always known.
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I think there's a karmic purpose that souls make before they decide to come into people's bodies and become someone's parent, or become someone's child. Maybe my dad disappearing was his way of giving me material with which to work, or a predisposition to feel heightened emotions.
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There is a branding influence on my work. But there's nothing really new about people as brands. The only difference is the scale and exposure.
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Some have said that the thesis [of indeterminacy] is a consequence of my behaviorism. Some have said that it is a reductio ad absurdum of my behaviorism. I disagree with this second point, but I agree with the first. I hold further that the behaviorism approach is mandatory. In psychology one may or may not be a behaviorist, but in linguistics one has no choice.
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I write songs in batches and then record them and then can't write again for ages. I try and build one song upon another, they may not obviously look inter-related but often one song acts as a springboard into another.
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The people starve because those above them eat too much tax-grain. That is the only reason why they starve.
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If I can't see stories in the lives of the people around me,--I just couldn't see them anywhere. If I can't see drama in humanity near me, I guess I couldn't detect it in humans far away.
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I write in the most classical French because this form is necessary for my novels: to translate the murky, floating, unsettling atmosphere I wanted them to have, I had to discipline it into the clearest, most traditional language possible.