Quotes from The Red and the Black

Quotations follow the Burton Raffel translation (Modern Library, 2004) — our recommended edition.

1. 2

   A novel is a mirror carried along a high road. At one moment it reflects to your vision the azure skies, at another the mire of the puddles at your feet.

2. 3

   La vérité, l'âpre vérité. (The truth, the bitter truth.)

3. 4

   The little town of Verrières can pass for one of the prettiest in Franche-Comté.

4. 5

   And the man who carries this mirror in his pack will be accused by you of being immoral! His mirror shews the mire, and you blame the mirror!

5. 6

   I think being condemned to death is the only real distinction. It is the only thing which cannot be bought.

6. 7

   One can acquire everything in solitude except character.

7. 8

   Each man for himself in that desert of egoism which is called life.

8. 9

   Our true passions are selfish.

9. 10

   What is the use of a love that makes one yawn? One might as well take to religion.

10. 11

    The tyranny of public opinion (and what an opinion!) is as fatuous in the small towns of France as it is in the United States of America.

11. 12

    Love born in the brain is more spirited, doubtless, than true love, but it has only flashes of enthusiasm; it knows itself too well, it criticizes itself incessantly; so far from banishing thought, it is itself reared only upon a structure of thought.

12. 13

    One of the traits of genius is not to drag its thought through the rut worn by vulgar minds.

13. 14

    I see nothing but condemnation upon condemnation, and all because of a man who dared to rise above his station.

14. 15

    Indeed, man has two different beings inside him. What devil thought of that malicious touch?

15. 16

    A good book is an event in my life.

16. 17

    After moral poisoning, one requires physical remedies and a bottle of champagne.