Quotes From "The Solitaire Mystery" By Jostein Gaarder

How terribly sad it was that people are made in...
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How terribly sad it was that people are made in such a way that they get used to something as extraordinary as living. Jostein Gaarder
When you realize there is something you don't understand, then...
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When you realize there is something you don't understand, then you're generally on the right path to understanding all kinds of things. Jostein Gaarder
As long as we are children, we have the ability...
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As long as we are children, we have the ability to experience things around us--but then we grow used to the world. To grow up is to get drunk on sensory experience. Jostein Gaarder
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Our lives are part of a unique adventure... Nevertheless, most of us think the world is 'normal' and are constantly hunting for something abnormal--like angels or Martians. But that is just because we don't realize the world is a mystery. As for myself, I felt completely different. I saw the world as an amazing dream. I was hunting for some kind of explanation of how everything fit together. Jostein Gaarder
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Although you may not stumble across a Martian in the garden, you might stumble across yourself. The day that happens, you'll probably also scream a little. And that'll be perfectly all right, because it's not every day you realize you're a living planet dweller on a little island in the universe. Jostein Gaarder
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I have gone around observing your activities from the outside. Because of this I have also been able to see things to which you have been blind.. Every morning you have gone to work, but you have never been fully awake. Of course, you have seen the sun and the moon, the stars in the sky, and everything that moves, but you haven't really seen it at all. It is different for the Joker, because he was put into this world with a flaw: He sees too clearly and too much. Jostein Gaarder
If just one of [those people] experiences life as a...
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If just one of [those people] experiences life as a crazy adventure--and I mean that he, or she, experiences this every single day... Then he or she is a joker in a pack of cards. Jostein Gaarder
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A joker is a little fool who is different from everyone else. He's not a club, diamond, heart, or spade. He's not an eight or a nine, a king or a jack. He is an outsider. He is placed in the same pack as the other cards, but he doesn't belong there. Therefore, he can be removed without anybody missing him. Jostein Gaarder