Frasi e Citazioni inglesi sulla morte
Migliori frasi e citazioni inglesi sulla morte
“A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.”
Variants: One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is just a statistic.
A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.
When one dies, it is a tragedy. When a million die, it is a statistic.
In Портрет тирана (1981) (Portrait of a Tyrant), Soviet historian Anton Antonov-Ovseyenko attributes the following version to Stalin: "When one man dies it's a tragedy. When thousands die it's statistics." This is the alleged response of Stalin during the 1943 Tehran conference when Churchill objected to an early opening of a second front in France.<!-- The book appears to have a footnote sourceing the claim, but I couldn't access it. Could someone please try to scare up a paper copy and have a look at footnote 188? -->
In her review "Mustering Most Memorable Quips" of Konstantin Dushenko's 1997 Dictionary of Modern Quotations (Словарь современных цитат: 4300 ходячих цитат и выражений ХХ века, их источники, авторы, датировка), Julia Solovyova states: "Russian historians have no record of the lines, 'Death of one man is a tragedy. Death of a million is a statistic,' commonly attributed by English-language dictionaries to Josef Stalin."
This quotation may originate from "Französischer Witz" (1925) by Kurt Tucholsky: "Darauf sagt ein Diplomat vom Quai d'Orsay: «Der Krieg? Ich kann das nicht so schrecklich finden! Der Tod eines Menschen: das ist eine Katastrophe. Hunderttausend Tote: das ist eine Statistik!»" ("To which a Quai d'Orsay diplomat replies: «The war? I can't find it so terrible! The death of one man: that is a catastrophe. One hundred thousand deaths: that is a statistic!»")
Another possible source or intermediary may be the concluding words of chapter 8 of the 1956 novel The Black Obelisk by Erich Maria Remarque: "Aber das ist wohl so, weil ein einzelner immer der Tod ist — und zwei Millionen immer nur eine Statistik." ("But probably the reason is that one dead man is death—and two million are only a statistic." 1958 Crest Book reprint)
Mary Soames (daughter of Churchill) claims to have overheard Stalin deliver a variant of the quote in immediate postwar Berlin (Remembrance Sunday Andrew Marr interview BBC 2011) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hP2tpw9XEw
See also Jean Rostand, Thoughts of a Biologist, 1939: "Kill one man, and you are a murderer. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill them all, and you are a god."
In an interview given for the 1983 three-part documentary Der Prozeß by Norddeutscher Rundfunk on the Third Majdanek trial, Simon Wiesenthal attributes the quote to the unpublished auto-biography of Adolf Eichmann. According to Wiesenthal, Eichmann had been asked by another member of the Reich Main Security Office during WWII what they should answer would they be questioned after the war about the millions of dead Jews they were responsible for, to which Eichmann according to his own testimony had replied with the quote.
Misattributed
Variante: The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic.
“Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside while still alive. Never surrender.”
La morte non è la perdita più grande della vita. La più grande perdita è ciò che muore dentro mentre si è ancora in vita. Mai arrendersi.
Variante: Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside while still alive. Never surrender.
“Cowards die a thousand deaths, but the brave only die once.”
Origine: A Farewell to Arms
“It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.”
Origine: Meditations
“We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.”
Siamo qui per ridere delle probabilità e vivere le nostre vite così bene che la Morte tremerà per prenderci.
“HUMAN BEINGS MAKE LIFE SO INTERESTING. DO YOU KNOW, THAT IN A UNIVERSE SO FULL OF WONDERS, THEY HAVE MANAGED TO INVENT BOREDOM. (Death)”
GLI ESSERI UMANI RENDONO LA VITA COSÌ INTERESSANTE. E' COMPRENSIBILE CHE IN UN UNIVERSO COSÌ PIENO DI MERAVIGLIE SONO ARRIVATI A INVENTARE LA NOIA.
Origine: Hogfather
“It's necessary to have wished for death in order to know how good it is to live.”
Origine: The Count of Monte Cristo
“I meant to write about death, only life came breaking in as usual”
Volevo scrivere della morte, solo la vita è arrivata come al solito
“If you really come down to any large story that interests people – holds the attention for a considerable time … human stories are practically always about one thing, aren't they? Death. The inevitability of death.”
Se davvero ti imbatti in una grande storia che realmente interessa alla gente - ovvero di quelle che trattengono l'attenzione per un tempo considerevole... le storie sugli uomini riguardano praticamente sempre una cosa, non è vero? La morte. L'inevitabilità della morte.
Tolkien in Oxford (1968) http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/writers/12237.shtml, a BBC 2 television documentary (at 21:49)
Opium (1929)
“The death of one man is a just death, the death of two millions is a statistic.”
La morte di un uomo è solo una morte, quella di due milioni è statistica.
Aber das ist wohl so, weil ein einzelner immer der Tod ist — und zwei Millionen immer nur eine Statistik.
Der schwarze Obelisk (1956)
A variant of this quote "One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is just a statistic." has also been attributed to Joseph Stalin, but no source for this has been found. This version appeared in the English press not later than 1958. (Ремарк, Эрих Мария // Словарь современных цитат / составитель К. В. Душенко — Москва: изд-во «Эксмо», 2006)
“Our knowledge of life is limited to death”
Origine: All Quiet on the Western Front
“Life is a disease, brother, and death begins already at birth. Every breath, every heartbeat, is a moment of dying - a little shove toward the end.”
La vita è una malattia, fratello, e la morte inizia già alla nascita. Ogni respiro, ogni battito del cuore, è un momento di morte, una piccola spinta verso la fine.
Origine: Three Comrades
“Freedom for the wolves has often meant death to the sheep.”
Origine: Blackbird Singing: Poems and Lyrics, 1965-1999
“Sleep. Those little slices of death. How I loathe them.”
Various forms of this quote are attributed to Poe, primarily by a title card in the movie A Nightmare on Elm Street 3, though there is no record of his having ever said it.
Misattributed
“Death is not the worst evil, but rather when we wish to die and cannot.”
Electra, 1007.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“Once you label me you negate me.”
As attributed in Journal of Marriage and Family Counseling, Vol. 2 (1976) by American Association of Marriage and Family Counselors, p. 33; no earlier incidents have been located.
Variants:
When you label me, you negate me.
As attributed in Inner Joy (1985) by Kory Bloomfield, p 169
Disputed
Variante: What labels me, negates me.
“DON'T THINK OF IT AS DYING, said Death. JUST THINK OF IT AS LEAVING EARLY TO AVOID THE RUSH.”
Origine: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
“All men have fears, but the brave put down their fears and go forward, sometimes to death, but always to victory.”
Tutti gli uomini hanno paura, ma i coraggiosi mettono da parte le loro paure e vanno avanti, a volte fino alla morte, ma sempre alla vittoria.
Origine: How to Win Friends and Influence People
“You only live twice:
Once when you are born
And once when you look death in the face.”
Origine: You Only Live Twice (1964), Ch. 11 : Anatomy Class
“As a day well spent procures a happy sleep, so a life well employed procures a happy death.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
Not by Twain, but from Edward Abbey's A Voice Crying In The Wilderness (1989).
Misattributed
“The mystery of love is greater than the mystery of death.”
„Non aveva mai capito che senso avesse fare a pezzi le persone, come faceva Clarissa Dalloway - farle a pezzi e poi rimetterle assieme.“
le mystère de l'amour est plus grand que le mystère de la mort.
Origine: Salomé (1893)
“Laugh at death and die of laughter.”
Attributed
The Wheel of Time: Shamans of Ancient Mexico, Their Thoughts About Life, Death and the Universe], (1998), Quotations from A Separate Reality (Chapter 6)
“Love has no age, no limit; and no death.”
BBC interview http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2002/11/20/john_cleese_die_another_day_interview.shtml on Die Another Day (20 November 2002)]