Frasi di Charles Augustin de Sainte-Beuve

“[…] il critico è solo un uomo che sa leggere e che insegna a leggere agli altri […].”

“Noi siamo tuoi figli! Le tue idee, le tue passioni, i tuoi sogni non sono più solo le nostre, ma tu ci hai indicato la strada e seguiamo le tue tracce.”

“Il sistema di Gautier, mediante descrizione, è un sistema di trasposizione, una riduzione esatta, equivalente, piuttosto che una traduzione. Così come si riduce una sinfonia al pinoforte, egli riduce un quadro all'articolo.”

citato in Introduzione a Le avventure dell'ultimo Abenceragio, a cura di Jole Pascarelli, Edizioni Paoline, 1966, p. 10

“In gioventù, i pensieri mi venivano sotto forma di sonetti; adesso, sotto forma di massime.”

“Ci sono giorni in cui lo spirito si sveglia al mattino, con la spada fuori del fodero, e vorrebbe devastare tutto.”

Origine: Massime facenti seguito a un portrait di La Rochefoucauld, I

“Despair itself if it goes on long enough, can become a kind of sanctuary in which one settles down and feels at ease.”

XLIV
Massime facenti seguito a un portrait di La Rochefoucauld

Charles Augustin de Sainte-Beuve: Frasi in inglese

“Since it is necessary to have enemies, let us endeavour to have those who do us honour.”

Le désespoir lui-même, pour peu qu'il se prolonge, devient une sorte d'asile dans lequel on peut s'asseoir et reposer.

"Vie de Joseph Delorme" (1829), cited from Poésies completes de Sainte-Beuve (Paris: Charpentier, 1840) p. 16; Mardy Grothe Oxymoronica (London: HarperCollins, 2004) p. 201.

“A philosophical thought has probably not attained all its sharpness and all its illumination until it is expressed in French”

Puisqu'il faut avoir des ennemis, tâchons d'en avoir qui nous fassent honneur.
Derniers portraits littéraires (1852; Paris: Didier, 1858) p. 534 ; translated by W. Fraser Rae, in Sainte-Beuve English Portraits (London: Dalby, Isbister, 1875) p. xci.

“To lend freshness to things known, to spread knowledge of things new; an excellent program for a critic.”

Society for Pure English, Tract 5 The Englishing of French Words; The Dialectal Words in Blunden's Poems Author: Society for Pure English Release Date: June 5, 2004

“Silence is the sovereign contempt.”

Renouveler les choses connues, vulgariser les choses neuves: un bon programme pour un critique.
Causeries du lundi, vol. 11 (1856; Paris: Garnier, 1868) p. 512; Philo M. Buck, Jr. Literary Criticism (New York: Harper, 1930) p. 398

“Let us beware of irony when making judgements. Of all the dispositions of the mind, irony is the least intelligent.”

Le silence seul est le souverain mépris.
Pensées et maximes (Paris: B. Grasset, 1954) p. 271; Nicholas Rescher Communicative Pragmatism and Other Philosophical Essays on Language (Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998) p. 146.

“Injustice…is a mother who is never barren, and bears children worthy of her.”

Gardons-nous de l'ironie en jugeant. De toutes les dispositions de l'esprit, l'ironie est la moins intelligente.
Notebook entry, February 24, 1848, cited from Les cahiers de Sainte-Beuve (Paris: Alphonse Lemerre, 1876) p. 75; Christopher Prendergast The Classic (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007) p. 244.

“Most often we are judging not others, but rather our own faculties in others.”

L'injustice…est une mère qui n'est jamais sterile, et qui produit des enfants dignes d'elle. <br class="br">Causeries du lundi (Paris: Garnier, 1857) vol. 1, p. 148; E. J. Trechmann (trans.) Causeries du Lundi (London: George Routledge, 1909) vol. 1, p. 117. <br class="br">Sainte-Beuve was here merely reporting words spoken by Adolphe Thiers, but many French quotation websites (e.g. Dico-Citations http://www.dico-citations.com/l-injustice-est-une-m-re-qui-n-est-jamais-st-rile-et-qui-produit-des-enfants-dignes-d-elle-sainte-beuve-charles-augustin/) attribute them to Sainte-Beuve himself. <br class="br">Misattributed

“...I can savor a work, but it is difficult for me to judge it independently from the author, and I would gladly say, as is the tree, so is the fruit.”

Le plus souvent nous ne jugeons pas les autres, mais nous jugeons nos propres facultés dans les autres.
Œuvres choisies (Paris: A. Hatier, 1934) p. 774; Andrew George Lehmann Sainte-Beuve (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962) p. 301.

“For the soul arrives therebye at a certain fixed and invincible state, a state which is genuinely heroic, and from out of which the greatest deeds it ever performs are executed.”

Originale: (fr) ...je puis goûter une œuvre, mais il m'est difficile de la juger indépendamment de la connaissance de l'homme même, et je dirais volontiers: tel arbre, tel fruit.