August Strindberg Quotes

At last everything was satisfactorily arranged, and I could not help admiring the setting: these mingled touches betrayed on a small scale the inspiration of a poet, the research of a scientist, the good taste of an artist, the gourmet’s fondness for good food, and the love of flowers, which concealed in their delicate shadows a hint of the love of women

~ August Strindberg

Family ... the home of all social evil, a charitable institution for comfortable women, an anchorage for house-fathers, and a hell for children.

~ August Strindberg

Yes, I am crying although I am a man. But has not a man eyes! Has not a man hands, limbs,senses, thoughts, passions? Is he not fed with the wine food, hurt by the same weapons, warmed and cooled by the same summer and winter as a woman? If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? And if you poison us, do we not die? Why shouldn't a man complain, a soldier weep? Because it is unmanly? Why is it unmanly?

~ August Strindberg

You do much worse things- you who can see to other planets.- Bertha, The Father

~ August Strindberg

There are poisons that blind you, and poisons that open your eyes.

~ August Strindberg

He liked the girls, liked to hold them around the waist, felt like a man when he did. But as for talking with them, no, no! Then he felt as though he were dealing with another species of human being, in some cases a higher one, in others a lower. He secretly admired the weak, pale, little girl and had picked her to be his wife. That was still the only way he could think of a woman - as a wife. He danced in a very chaste and proper manner, but he heard awful stories about his pals, stories he didn't understand until later. They could dance the waltz backwards around the room in a very indecent way, and they told naughty stories about the girls.

~ August Strindberg

Those who won't accept evil never get anything good.

~ August Strindberg

Growing old - it's not nice but it's interesting.

~ August Strindberg

I see the playwright as a lay preacher peddling the ideas of his time in popular form.

~ August Strindberg

Why is it so painful to watch a person sink? Because there is something unnatural in it, for nature demands personal progress, evolution, and every backward step means wasted energy.

~ August Strindberg

Happiness consumes itself like a flame. It cannot burn for ever, it must go out, and the presentiment of its end destroys it at its very peak.

~ August Strindberg

People who keep dogs are cowards who haven't got the guts to bite people themselves.

~ August Strindberg

Friendship can only exist between persons with similar interests and points of view. Man and woman by the conventions of society are born with different interests and different points of view.

~ August Strindberg

That is the thankless position of the father in the family - the provider for all, and the enemy of all.

~ August Strindberg