Natalia Ginzburg
Natalia Ginzburg
Natalia Ginzburg née Leviwas an Italian author whose work explored family relationships, politics during and after the Fascist years and World War II, and philosophy. She wrote novels, short stories and essays, for which she received the Strega Prize and Bagutta Prize. Most of her works were also translated into English and published in the United Kingdom and United States...
NationalityItalian
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth14 July 1916
CountryItaly
money defense fragility
The true defense against wealth is not a fear of wealth - of its fragility and of the vicious consequences that it can bring - the true defense against wealth is an indifference to money.
caution children contempt courage desire generosity great success taught thrift virtues
Children should be taught not the little virtues but the great ones. Not thrift but generosity and an indifference to money; not caution but courage and a contempt for danger; not a desire for success but a desire to be and to know.
country children wall
When I write stories I am like someone who is in her own country, walking along streets that she has known since she was a child, between walls and trees that are hers.
fate men today
Today, as never before, the fates of men are so intimately linked to one another that a disaster for one is a disaster for everybody.
made ill rate
You aren't ill: it is just that you are made of second-rate materials
england looks surprise
But the English do not know what surprise is. No one ever turns his head to look at anyone else in the street.
country world england
I begin to suspect that England is the most melancholy country in the world.
country government confusion
Italy is a country which is willing to submit itself to the worst governments. It is, as we know, a country ruled by disorder, cynicism, incompetence and confusion. Nevertheless we are aware of intelligence circulating in the streets like a vivid bloodstream.
two clothes imagination
The English have no imagination: and yet they do show imagination in two things - two only. In the evening-clothes worn by old ladies, and in their cafés.
money being-free concerned
Being moderate with oneself and generous with others; this is what is meant by having a just relationship with money, by being free as far as money is concerned.
moving people parent
And we are a people without tears. The things that moved our parents do not move us at all.
real sorrow
Over my real sorrows I never weep.
country children wall
My vocation is to write and I have known this for a long time. I hope I won't be misunderstood; I know nothing about the value of the things I am able to write. I know that writing is my vocation. When I sit down to write I feel extraordinarily at ease, and I move in an element which, it seems to me, I know extraordinarily well; I use tools that are familiar to me and they fit snugly in my hands. But when I write stories I am like someone who is in her own country, walking along streets that she has known since she was a child, between walls and trees that are hers.
regret feelings complexes
My tidiness, and my untidiness, are full of regret and remorse and complex feelings.