André Gide - Autumn Leaves

Gide’s reminiscences, thoughts and insights constitute a synthesis of his work as well as an intellectual panorama of the first half of the 20th century.

1In L’Immoraliste (The Immoralist) the property is called La Morinière , the actual name of the castle’s farm. La Roque had belonged to André Gide’s maternal grandfather, M. Rondeau. Gide sold it in 1900.

2See his letter to Paul Valéry dated May 1896. André Gide and Paul Valéry, Correspondance 1890–1942 , ed. Robert Mallet (Paris: Gallimard 1955) 264-5.

3Gide’s trip to Africa was at the French government’s official invitation.

4Marc Allégret, who accompanied him, took photographs that were later made into a film.

5Several essays that appear in this volume are translations of pieces that may be considered part of the literature linked to the French Resistance and the Free French, followers of Charles De Gaulle, because a number of these writings initially appeared in publications banned in Vichy France (for example, L’Arche and Combat, Lettres française and Charlot, a publisher in Alger during the war.)

Jeanine Parisier Plottel

New York, New York 2012

JEANINE PARISIER PLOTTEL, professor emeritus of French, CUNY Hunter College & The Graduate Center, is the former executive director of the New York State Conference, American Association of University Professors and former chair of the Hunter Dept. of Romance Languages. The French government has decorated her twice (Palmes Académiques) for her contribution to French language, literature and culture. She is a former trustee of Barnard College, and a trustee of the Society for French-American Cultural Exchange (FACE). She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Maison Française at Columbia University, the Institute for French Studies at New York University, and the Henri Peyre French Institute of the City University Graduate Center. An author of numerous books and articles in both English and French, the editor and publisher of New York Literary Forum, she is an honorary life member of the Modern Language Association. A graduate of Barnard College, she received her master’s and doctoral degrees in French literature from Columbia University.

Oh, would that my mind could let fall its dead ideas, as the tree does its withered leaves!

To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one’s freedom.

It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves — in finding themselves.

The true hypocrite is the one who ceases to perceive his deception, the one who lies with sincerity.

No theory is good unless it permits, not rest, but the greatest work. No theory is good except on condition that one use it to go on beyond.

Profound optimism is always on the side of the tortured.

Art begins with resistance — at the point where resistance is overcome. No human masterpiece has ever been created without great labor.

Sadness is almost never anything but a form of fatigue.

The most beautiful things are those that madness prompts and reason writes.

The individual never asserts himself more than when he forgets himself.

Be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in yourself — and thus make yourself indispensable.

Courage is very important. Like a muscle, it is strengthened by use.

Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But since no one was listening, everything must be said again.

God depends on us. It is through us that God is achieved.

I owe much to my friends; but, all things considered, it strikes me that I owe even more to my enemies. The real person springs life under a sting even better than under a caress.

The funny thing about love is that it must continually grow or it will diminish.

It is now, and in this world, that we must live.

A straight path never leads anywhere except to the objective.

There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them.

Obtain from yourself all that makes complaining useless. No longer implore from others what you yourself can obtain.

It is easier to lead men to combat, stirring up their passion, than to restrain them and direct them toward the patient labor of peace.

There are admirable potentialities in every human being. Believe in your strength and your youth. Learn to repeat endlessly to yourself, “It all depends on me.”

Sin is whatever obscures the soul.

Fear of ridicule begets the worst cowardice.

Too chaste a youth leads to a dissolute old age.

Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.

Dare to be yourself.

Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.

Nothing prevents happiness like the memory of happiness.

The most important things to say are those which often I did not think necessary for me to say — because they were too obvious.

Only those things are beautiful which are inspired by madness and written by reason.

Society knows perfectly well how to kill a man and has methods more subtle than death.

Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

It is good to follow one’s own bent, so long as it leads upward.

Know thyself. A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly. Whoever studies himself arrests his own development. A caterpillar who seeks to know himself would never become a butterfly.

Most quarrels amplify a misunderstanding.

In hell there is no other punishment than to begin over and over again the tasks left unfinished in your lifetime.

At times it seems that I am living my life backward, and that at the approach of old age my real youth will begin.

One doesn’t discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.

The color of truth is grey.

Welcome anything that comes to you, but do not long for anything else.

In order to be utterly happy the only thing necessary is to refrain from comparing this moment with other moments in the past, which I often did not fully enjoy because I was comparing them with other moments of the future.

The scholar seeks, the artist finds.

Are you then unable to recognize unless it has the same sound as yours?

A work of art is an exaggeration.

We live counterfeit lives in order to resemble the idea we first had of ourselves.

Our judgments about things vary according to the time left us to live — that we think is left us to live.

To win one’s joy through struggle is better than to yield to melancholy.

Old hands soil, it seems, whatever they caress, but they too have their beauty when they are joined in prayer. Young hands were made for caresses and the sheathing of love. It is a pity to make them join too soon.

One completely overcomes only what one assimilates.

What I dislike least in my former self are the moments of prayer.

The want of logic annoys. Too much logic bores. Life eludes logic, and everything that logic alone constructs remains artificial and forced.

So long as we live among men, let us cherish humanity.

Complete possession is proved only by giving. All you are unable to give possesses you.

To what a degree the same past can leave different marks — and especially admit of different interpretations.

It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle.