Albert Cohen

“Un soir qu'ils étaient couchés l'un près de l'autre, comme elle lui demandait d'inventer un poème qui commencerait par je connais un beau pays, il s'exécuta sur-le-champ. Je connais un beau pays Il est de l'or et d'églantine Tout le monde s'y sourit Ah quelle aventure fine Les tigres y sont poltrons Les agneaux ont fière mine À tous les vieux vagabonds Ariane donne des tartines. Alors, elle lui baisa le la main, et il eut honte de cette admiration.”

“Alone dwells every man and everyone mocks everyone else, and a deserted island is our pain.”

“Yes, the words, the land of my birth, they console me and compensate, but they would not bring me my mother back.”

“Go away, image of my living mother, full of life, as I saw her in France for the last time. Go away! My mother's ghost.”

“In my solitude I sing to myself a sweet lullaby, as sweet as my mother used to sing to me.”

“I say to myself that her small hands are no more worm, and that I would never again carry them soft to my front.”

“Never again I would know her slow kisses which are hardly felt. Never again the ringing mourning bells, songs of the dead that we loved.”

“Human friends, friends in hardship and in life, this is our pure love, love of mother and son.”

“My true single consolation is that she is not present to see me in my agony of her death.”

“In my sleep, which is the song of the tombs, I have just seen her again, as beautiful as in her youth.”

“She answers no more, the one who used to answer always.”

“She does not talk anymore, the one who used to talk so pleasantly.”

“With her alone I could be far away from everyone.”

“Only with her I was not alone, now I am alone with everyone.”

“Brothers, my human brothers, force me to believe in eternal life.”