Quotes by Herta Muller

About Herta Muller:

Herta Müller is a German novelist, poet, essayist and recipient of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Literature. Born in Ni?chidorf, Timi? County in Romania, her native language is German. Since the early 1990s she has been internationally established, and her works have been translated into more than twenty languages.
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Irene mai avea o banuiala: ca-si tinea in cap dorul de-acasa mic, facut ghem,ca nu cumva sa-l recunoasca. Ca atunci cand aparea, il reprima.Si ca, pentru a-si sufoca simturile,aseza pe ele cladiri intregi din gandurile ei.

Herta Muller

To combat death you don't need much of a life, just one that isn't yet finished.

Herta Muller

I'm always telling myself I don't have many feelings. Even when something does affect me I'm only moderately moved. I almost never cry. It's not that I'm stronger than the ones with teary eyes, I'm weaker. They have courage. When all you are is skin ...

Herta Muller

No words are adequate for the suffering caused by hunger. To this day I have to show hunger that I escaped his grasp. Ever since I stopped having to go hungry, I literally eat life itself. And when I eat, I am locked up inside the taste of eating. Fo...

Herta Muller

Todo lo que tengo lo llevo conmigo.
 O: todo lo mío lo llevo conmigo.
 He llevado todo lo que tenía. No era mío. Era o algo destinado a otras finalidades o de otra persona. […] Llevo un equipaje de silencio. Me he rodeado de un silencio tan ...

Herta Muller

I have packed myself into silence so deeply and for so long that I can never unpack myself using words. When I speak, I only pack myself a little differently.

Herta Muller

Everyday brought me further away from other people, I had been placed out of the world's sight, as if in a cupboard, and I hoped it would stay that way. I developed a yearning for being alone, unkempt, untended.

Herta Muller

Lola writes in her notebook: Leaf-fleas are even worse. Someone said, They don't bite people, because people don't have leaves. Lola writes, When the sun is beating down, they bite everything, even the wind. And we all have leaves. Leaves fall off wh...

Herta Muller

At a time I used to think that in a world without guards people would walk differently from the way we do in our country. Where people are allowed to think and write differently, I thought, they will also walk differently.

Herta Muller

Today the grass listens when I speak of love. It seems to me that this word isn't honest even with itself.

Herta Muller

Windisch closes his eyes. He feels his eyes. He feels his eyeballs in his hands. His eyes without a face.

Herta Muller

Jesus sleeps on the cross by the church door. When he wakes up, he'll be old. The air in the village will be brighter than his naked skin.

Herta Muller

He's looking into the night, in case a shadow comes to listen and look.

Herta Muller

The soldiers lie in the grey morning. Thickets separate them. They are on manoeuvres. They are at war with their hands, their eyes, their foreheads.

Herta Muller

What can't be said can be written. Because writing is a silent act, a labor from the head to the hand.

Herta Muller

Anything in literature, including memory, is second-hand.

Herta Muller

Suffering doesn't improve human beings, does it?

Herta Muller

I have always written only for myself - to clarify things, to clarify things with myself, to understand in an inner way what is actually happening.

Herta Muller

In writing, one searches, and that is what keeps one writing, that one sees and experiences things from another angle entirely; one experiences oneself during the process of writing.

Herta Muller

Writing itself does not know what it looks like while one is doing it, only when it's finished.

Herta Muller

Author Bio

  • NameHerta Muller
  • DescriptionGerman-Romanian novelist, poet and essayist
  • BornAugust 17, 1953
  • CountryGermany
  • ProfessionWriter; Linguist; Poet; Translator; Novelist; Essayist
  • WorksNadirs; The Passport; The Land Of Green Plums; The Hunger Angel
  • AwardsNobel Prize In Literature; Adam Müller-Guttenbrunn-Förderpreis; Premiul UTC La Sec?iunea „lucr?ri În Limbile Na?ionalit??ilor Conlocuitoare"; Aspekte-Literaturpreis; Rauriser Literaturpreis; Förderpreis Zum Literaturpreis Der Stadt Bremen; Marieluise-Fleißer-Preis; Deutscher Sprachpreis; Roswitha Prize; Kranichsteiner Literaturpreis; Deutscher Kritikerpreis; Kleist Prize; Aristeion Prize; Franz-Nabl Prize; Ida-Dehmel-Literaturpreis; International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award; Franz-Kafka-Preis; Cicero-Rednerpreis; Tübinger Poetik-Dozentur; Carl Zuckmayer Medal; Joseph-Breitbach-Preis; Literaturpreis Der Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung; Berliner Literaturpreis; Würth-Preis Für Europäische Literatur; Walter-Hasenclever-Literaturpreis; Ehrengabe Der Heinrich-Heine-Gesellschaft; Franz Werfel Human Rights Award; Hoffmann Von Fallersleben Prize; Samuel-Bogumil-Linde Prize; Monismanien Prize; Stadtschreiber Von Bergen; Ricarda-Huch-Preis; Best Translated Book Award; Grand Cross Of The Order Of Merit Of The Federal Republic Of Germany With Star; Heinrich-Böll-Preis