The gods weave misfortunes for men, so that the generations to come will have something to sing about.” Mallarmé repeats, less beautifully, what Homer said; “tout aboutit en un livre, ” everything ends up in a book. The Greeks speak of generations that will sing; Mallarmé speaks of an object, of a thing among things, a book. But the idea is the same; the idea that we are made for art, we are made for memory, we are made for poetry, or perhaps we are made for oblivion. But something remains, and that something is history or poetry, which are not essentially different. . Jorge Luis Borges
About This Quote

This quote is a modern version of the ancient Greek saying: "History is written by the victors." But, as Mallarmé notes, history is not just written by the victors; it is also written by those who lose. And no one knows that better than the author of this quote, who lost his mother and six of his siblings in a concentration camp.

Source: Seven Nights

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