Nikos Kazantzakis Quotes
Greek - Writer February 18, 1883 - October 26, 2957


In order to succeed, we must first believe that we can.
Nikos Kazantzakis

The real meaning of enlightenment is to gaze with undimmed eyes on all darkness.
Nikos Kazantzakis

I said to the almond tree, 'Friend, speak to me of God,' and the almond tree blossomed.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Beauty is merciless. You do not look at it, it looks at you and does not forgive.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Behind each woman rises the austere, sacred and mysterious face of Aphrodite.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Life is trouble. Only death is not. To be alive is to unfasten your belt and look for a fight.
Nikos Kazantzakis

My principal anguish, and the wellspring of all my joys and sorrows, has been the incessant merciless battle between the spirit and the flesh.
Nikos Kazantzakis

My entire soul is a cry, and all my work is a commentary on that cry.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Since we cannot change reality, let us change the eyes which see reality.
Nikos Kazantzakis

May God forgive me, but the letters of the alphabet frighten me terribly. They are sly, shameless demons - and dangerous! You open the inkwell, release them; they run off - and how will you ever get control of them again!
Nikos Kazantzakis

Everything in this world has a hidden meaning.
Nikos Kazantz

A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope and be free.
Nikos Kazantzakis

I knew that no matter what door you knock on in a Cretan village, it will be opened for you. A meal will be served in your honor, and you will sleep between the best sheets in the house. In Crete, the stranger is still the unknown god. Before him, all doors and all hearts are opened.
Nikos Kazantzakis

I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.
Nikos Kazantzakis

All my life, I struggled to stretch my mind to the breaking point, until it began to creak, in order to create a great thought which might be able to give a new meaning to life, a new meaning to death, and to console mankind.
Nikos Kazantzakis

There is only one woman in the world. One woman, with many faces.
Nikos Kazantzakis

One of man's greatest obligations is anger.
Nikos Kazantzakis

True teachers use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create bridges of their own.
Nikos Kazantzakis

The human soul is heavy, clumsy, held in the mud of the flesh. Its perceptions are still coarse and brutish. It can divine nothing clearly, nothing with certainty.
Nikos Kazantzakis

I fight to embrace the entire circle of human activity to the full extent of my ability.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Every perfect traveler always creates the country where he travels.
Nikos Kazantzakis

A weak soul does not have the endurance to resist the flesh for very long. It grows heavy, becomes flesh itself, and the contest ends. But among responsible men, men who keep their eyes riveted day and night upon the Supreme Duty, the conflict between flesh and spirit breaks out mercilessly and may last until death.
Nikos Kazantzakis

The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.
Nikos Kazantzakis

Let your youth have free reign. It won't come again, so be bold, and no repenting.
Nikos Kazantzakis

I felt deep within me that the highest point a man can attain is not Knowledge or Virtue or Goodness or Victory but something even greater, more heroic and more despairing: Sacred Awe!
Nikos Kazantzakis

Life is a crusade in the service of God. Whether we wished to or not, we set out as crusaders to free - not the Holy Sepulcher - but that God buried in matter and in our souls.
Nikos Kazantzakis