Human life is a sad show, undoubtedly: ugly, heavy and complex. Art has no other end, for people of feeling, than to conjure away the burden and bitterness.

Car la vie humaine est une triste boutique, décidément. – Une chose laide, lourde & compliquée. L'art n'a point d'autre but, pr les gens d'esprit, que d'en escamotter le fardeau & l'amertume.

Gustave Flaubert

More information about this quote

Topic

Purpose of art Art Life The human condition

Author

Gustave Flaubert

Source

Letters of Gustave Flaubert

Medium

Letter

Language

French

Time

1864 1860s 19th century

Occupation

Novelist Writer

From

France Europe

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Letter to Amelie Bosquet. July 1864.

Illustrated Quote

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A quote by Gustave Flaubert about purpose of art: “Human life is a sad show, undoubtedly: ugly, heavy and complex. Art has…”
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Related Quotes

Below are one or more quotes that share at least one tag with the quote at the top of the page

Another quote by Gustave Flaubert

We shouldn't maltreat our idols: the gilt comes off on our hands.

Gustave Flaubert

Madame Bovary

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Read Madame Bovary at Project Gutenberg
More information about this quote
Topic
Idols

Author

Gustave Flaubert
Source
Madame Bovary
Medium
Novel
Language
French
Time
1857 1850s 19th century
Authentication Score 2
Original Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Madame Bovary: Moeurs de Province [Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners]. Revue de Paris, 1 Oct. 1856 - 15 Dec. 1856. Serial.

Current Citation

Flaubert, Gustave. Madame Bovary, edited and translated by Lydia Davis. Penguin Classics, 2011, pt. 3, ch. 6.

Another quote from the 1860s

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged!

John Wilkes Booth

More information about this quote
Topic
American Civil War
Speaker
John Wilkes Booth
Language
English
Time
1865 1860s 19th century
Authentication Score 2
Citation

Booth, John Wilkes. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln. 14 Apr. 1865, Ford's Theatre, Washington DC, USA.

Another quote about The human condition

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is stuck with the difference between what things are, and what they ought to be.

William Hazlitt

More information about this quote
Topic
Laughter Crying The human condition

Author

William Hazlitt
Language
English
Time
1818 1810s 19th century
Authentication Score 3
Citation

Hazlitt, William. "On Wit and Humour." Lectures on the English Comic Writers. c. 1818, Surrey Institution, London, England, UK.

Another quote from 1864

Taste...Is the only morality...Tell me what you like, and I'll tell you what you are.

John Ruskin

More information about this quote
Topic
Taste
Speaker
John Ruskin
Medium
Lecture
Language
English
Time
1864 1860s 19th century
Authentication Score 3
Original Citation

Ruskin, John. "Traffic." c. 1864, Town Hall, Bradford, England, UK. Lecture.

Current Citation

Ruskin, John. Traffic. Penguin UK, 2015.

Another quote originally in French

To have common glories in the past, a common will in the present; to have done great things together, to will to do the like again-these are the essential conditions for the making of a people.

Ernest Renan

More information about this quote
Topic
Political community

Author

Ernest Renan
Source
What is a Nation?
Medium
Lecture
Language
French
Time
1882 1880s 19th century
Authentication Score 1
Original Citation

Renan, Ernest. "Qu’est-ce qu’une nation? [What is a Nation?]" 11 Mar. 1882, University of Sorbonne, Paris, France, pt. 3.

Current Citation

Renan, Ernest. "What is a Nation?" What is a Nation and Other Political Writings, translated by M. F. N. Giglioli. Columbia University Press, 2018, ch. 10, pt. 3.