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Home
Authors
Karl Kraus
Austrian
Writer
About the author
You would be surprised how hard it often is to translate an action into thought.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Action
#Thought
Sentimental irony is a dog that bays at the moon while pissing on graves.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Moon
#Irony
No ideas and the ability to express them - that's a journalist.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Ability
#Ideas
Scandal begins when the police put a stop to it.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Police
#Scandal
Psychoanalysis is that mental illness for which it regards itself as therapy.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Illness
#Therapy
#Psychoanalysis
My unconscious knows more about the consciousness of the psychologist than his consciousness knows about my unconscious.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Unconscious
#Consciousness
Morality is a venereal disease. Its primary stage is called virtue; its secondary stage, boredom; its tertiary stage, syphilis.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Disease
#Virtue
#Morality
#Boredom
Matrimony is the union of meanness and martyrdom.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Matrimony
When a man is treated like a beast, he says, 'After all, I'm human.' When he behaves like a beast, he says 'After all, I'm only human.'
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Man
Justice is a whore that won't let herself be stiffed, and collects the wages of shame even from the poor.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Poor
#Justice
#Shame
#Wages
The mission of the press is to spread culture while destroying the attention span.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Culture
#Attention
#Press
#Mission
Journalists write because they have nothing to say, and have something to say because they write.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Nothing
Journalist: a person without any ideas but with an ability to express them; a writer whose skill is improved by a deadline: the more time he has, the worse he writes.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Time
#Ability
#Ideas
#Writer
#Skill
Language is the mother of thought, not its handmaiden.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Thought
#Language
#Mother
Sexuality poorly repressed unsettles some families; well repressed, it unsettles the whole world.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#World
#Sexuality
Solitude would be ideal if you could pick the people to avoid.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#People
#Solitude
Someone who can write aphorisms should not fritter away his time in essays.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Time
#Aphorisms
Squeeze human nature into the straitjacket of criminal justice and crime will appear.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Will
#Crime
#Justice
#Nature
#Human nature
The closer the look one takes at a word, the greater distance from which it looks back.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Word
The sound principle of a topsy-turvy lifestyle in the framework of an upside-down world order has stood every test.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#World
#Sound
#Order
The trouble with Germans is not that they fire shells, but that they engrave them with quotations from Kant.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Trouble
#Fire
#Quotations
There are people who can never forgive a beggar for their not having given him anything.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#People
There is no more unfortunate creature under the sun than a fetishist who yearns for a woman's shoe and has to settle for the whole woman.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Woman
#Sun
To me all men are equal: there are jackasses everywhere, and I have the same contempt for them all.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Men
#Contempt
Virginity is the ideal of those who want to deflower.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Want
#Virginity
Jealousy is a dog's bark which attracts thieves.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Jealousy
Science is spectral analysis. Art is light synthesis.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Art
#Science
#Light
Stupidity is an elemental force for which no earthquake is a match.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Stupidity
#Force
A woman who cannot be ugly is not beautiful.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Woman
#Ugly
It is the style of idealism to console itself for the loss of something old with the ability to gape at something new.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Style
#Ability
#Old
#Loss
#Idealism
Sex education is legitimate in that girls cannot be taught soon enough how children don't come into the world.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Children
#World
#Education
#Girls
#Sex
A fine world in which man reproaches woman with fulfilling his heart's desire!
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Heart
#World
#Man
#Woman
A writer is someone who can make a riddle out of an answer.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Writer
An idea's birth is legitimate if one has the feeling that one is catching oneself plagiarizing oneself.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Feeling
#Idea
Children play soldier. That makes sense. But why do soldiers play children?
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Children
#Play
#Sense
#Soldiers
Christian morality prefers remorse to precede lust, and then lust not to follow.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Remorse
#Christian
#Morality
#Lust
Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Country
#Morals
#Corruption
#Prostitution
Culture is the tacit agreement to let the means of subsistence disappear behind the purpose of existence. Civilization is the subordination of the latter to the former.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Culture
#Civilization
#Purpose
#Agreement
#Existence
Curses on the law! Most of my fellow citizens are the sorry consequences of uncommitted abortions.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Consequences
Democracy divides people into workers and loafers. It makes no provision for those who have no time to work.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Time
#People
#Work
#Democracy
#Workers
Democracy means the opportunity to be everyone's slave.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Democracy
#Opportunity
Do not learn more than you absolutely need to get through life.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Life
It is better not to express what one means than to express what one does not mean.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
A child learns to discard his ideals, whereas a grown-up never wears out his short pants.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Ideals
Education is a crutch with which the foolish attack the wise to prove that they are not idiots.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Education
#Idiots
I had a terrible vision: I saw an encyclopedia walk up to a polymath and open him up.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Open
I don't like to meddle in my private affairs.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
I and my public understand each other very well: it does not hear what I say, and I don't say what it wants to hear.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Public
I and life: The case was settled chivalrously. The opponents parted without having made up.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Opponents
I am already so popular that anyone who vilifies me becomes more popular than I am.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Popular
How is the world ruled and led to war? Diplomats lie to journalists and believe these lies when they see them in print.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#World
#War
#Lies
#Lie
He who does without the praise of the crowd will not deny himself an opportunity to be his own adherent.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Will
#Opportunity
#Praise
Feminine passion is to masculine as an epic is to an epigram.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Passion
Experiences are savings which a miser puts aside. Wisdom is an inheritance which a wastrel cannot exhaust.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Wisdom
#Miser
#Inheritance
Education is what most receive, many pass on, and few possess.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Education
If the reporter has killed our imagination with his truth, he threatens our life with his lies.
Karl Kraus,
Austrian
Writer
#Life
#Imagination
#Truth
#Lies