Like writing, reading is a protest against the insufficiencies of life. — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“Living is worth the effort if only because without life we could not read or imagine stories.” — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“We invent fictions in order to live somehow the many lives we would like to lead when we barely have one at… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
Reading was such an enrichment of my life. And it was that pleasure that I had as a very young reader probably… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
I never get the feeling that I've decided rationally, cold-bloodedly to write a story. On the contrary, certain events or people, sometimes… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“Because of literature we can decipher, at least partially, the hieroglyphic that existence tends to be for the great majority of human… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
Reading good literature is an experience of pleasure...but it is also an experience of learning what and how we are, in our… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“Fictions exist because of this fact. Because we have only one life, and our desires and fantasies demand a thousand lives. Because… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“We would be worse than we are without the good books we have read, more conformist, not as restless, more submissive, and… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“From the cave to the skyscraper, from the club to weapons of mass destruction, from the tautological life of the tribe to… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
“At times I wondered whether writing was not a solipsistic luxury in countries like mine, where there were scant readers, so many… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share Image
I think everybody, or the great majority of human beings, have this aspiration to become other: to live a different identity, at least for… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Nothing better protects a human being against the stupidity of prejudice, racism, religious or political sectarianism, and exclusivist nationalism than this truth that invariably… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
I learnt to read when I was five, and I think that is the most important thing that happened to me. — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Death isn't enough. It doesn't remove the stain. But a slap, a whiplash, square on the face, does. Because a man's face is as… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
The writer’s job is to write with rigor, with commitment, to defend what they believe with all the talent they have. I think that’s… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
The truths that seem most truthful, if you look at them from all sides, if you look at them close up, turn out to… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
That is one thing I am sure of amid my many uncertainties regarding the literary vocation: deep inside, a writer feels that writing is… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Revolution will free society of its afflictions, while science will free the individual of his. — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
I think if you're impregnated with good literature, with good culture, you're much more difficult to manipulate, and you're much more aware of the… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Each book, for me, has been an adventure, a period of time dedicated to study, to document certain facts, to traveling, and also to… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Reading good literature is an experience of pleasure...but it is also an experience of learning what and how we are, in our human integrity… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
“they knew what we’re doing for them, they’d kiss our feet. But mentally they are closer to the crocodile and the hippopotamus than to… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
Iraq is better without Saddam Hussein than with Saddam Hussein. Without a doubt. — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
When I was growing up, the Spanish-speaking world was Balkanized. We were isolated. We didn't know what was happening in cultural terms in Ecuador,… — Mario Vargas Llosa Copy Share
