What is it you do, then? I'll tell you: You leave out whatever doesn't suit you. As the author himself has done before you. Just as you leave things out of your dreams and fantasies. By leaving things out, we bring beauty and excitement into the world. We evidently handle our reality by effecting some sort of compromise with it, an in-between state where the emotions prevent each other from reaching their fullest intensity, graying the colors somewhat. Children who haven't yet reached that point of control are both happier and unhappier than adults who have. And yes, stupid people also leave things out, which is why ignorance is bliss. So I propose, to begin with, that we try to love each other as if we were characters in a novel who have met in the pages of a book. Let's in any case leave off all the fatty tissue that plumps up reality. Robert Musil
About This Quote

Albert Camus, the famous French man who wrote "The Stranger", says that we should love each other as if we were characters in a novel that met in the pages of a book. It means that we should love each other even if we don't know each other, and especially if we have not yet met. We should also love our enemies as well as those who hate us, and do it out of a sense of duty, because this is simply what people do.

Source: The Man Without Qualities: Vol. 1

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