Marguerite Yourcenar
Overview
Marguerite Yourcenar was a Belgian-born French novelist and essayist. Winner of the Prix Femina
Prix Femina
The Prix Femina is a French literary prize created in 1904 by 22 writers for the magazine La Vie heureuse . The prize is decided each year by an exclusively female jury, although the authors of the winning works do not have to be women...

and the Erasmus Prize
Erasmus Prize
The Erasmus Prize is an annual prize awarded by the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation, a Dutch non-profit organization, to individuals or institutions that have made notable contributions to European culture, society, or social science. The Praemium Erasmianum Foundation was founded on 23 June 1958 by...

, she was the first woman elected to the Académie française
Académie française
L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...

, in 1980, and the seventeenth person to occupy Seat 3.
Yourcenar was born Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie Ghislaine Cleenewerck de Crayencour in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

, Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

 to Michel Cleenewerck de Crayencour, of French aristocratic descent, and a Belgian mother, Fernande de Cartier de Marchienne, who died ten days after her birth.
Quotations

Le malheur est que, parfois, des souhaits s'accomplissent, afin que se perpétue le supplice de l'espérance.

The unfortunate thing is that, because wishes sometimes come true, the agony of hoping is perpetuated.

Peu de bipèdes depuis Adam ont mérité le nom d'homme.

Few bipeds, from Adam's time down, have been worthy of the name of man.

Je crois qu'il faut presque toujours un coup de folie pour bâtir un destin.

A touch of madness is, I think, almost always necessary for constructing a destiny.

La lettre écrite m'a enseigné à écouter la voix humaine, tout comme les grandes attitudes immobiles des statues m'ont appris à apprécier les gestes.

The written word has taught me to listen to the human voice, much as the great unchanging statues have taught me to appreciate bodily motions. (p. 21)

Le véritable lieu de naissance est celui où l'on a porté pour la première fois un coup d'oeil intelligent sur soi-même: mes premières patries ont été des livres.

The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself; my first homelands have been books. (p. 33)

Des moments libres. Toute vie bien réglée a les siens, et qui ne sait pas les provoquer ne sait pas vivre.

Leisure moments: each life well regulated has some such intervals, and he who cannot make way for them does not know how to live. (p. 43)

Je savais que le bien comme le mal est affaire de routine, que le temporaire se prolonge, que l'extérieur s'infiltre au dedans, et que le masque, à la longue, devient visage.

I knew that good like bad becomes a routine, that the temporary tends to endure, that what is external permeates to the inside, and that the mask, given time, comes to be the face itself. (p. 97)

Les êtres humains avouent leurs pires faiblesses quand ils s'étonnent qu'un maître du monde ne soit pas sottement indolent, présomptueux, ou cruel.

Human beings betray their worst failings when they marvel to find that a world ruler is neither foolishly indolent, presumptuous, nor cruel. (p. 103)

Toute loi trop souvent transgressée est mauvaise: c'est au législateur à l'abroger ou à la changer.

Any law too often subject to infraction is bad; it is the duty of the legislator to repeal or change it. (p. 113)

 
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