13 Nikos Kazantzakis Quotes on Death

Nikos Kazantzakis quotes on death

13. We come from a dark abyss, we end in a dark abyss, and we call the luminous interval life. As soon as we are born the return begins, at once the setting forth and the coming back; we die in every moment. Because of this many have cried out: The goal of life is death! But as soon as we are born we begin the struggle to create, to compose, to turn matter into life; we are born in every moment. Because of this many have cried out: The goal of ephemeral life is immortality! In the temporary living organism these two streams collide ... both opposing forces are holy. It is our duty, therefore, to grasp that vision which can embrace and harmonize these two enormous, timeless, and indestructible forces, and with this vision to modulate our thinking and our action.

20. Never acknowledge the limitations of man. Smash all boundaries! Deny whatever your eyes see. Die every moment, but say: 'Death does not exist.'

37. I am NOT nothing! A vaporous phosphorescence on a damp meadow, a miserable worm that crawls and loves, that shouts and talks about wings for an hour or two until his mouth is blocked with earth. The dark powers give no other answer. But within me a deathless Cry, superior to me, continues to shout. For whether I want to or not, I am also, without doubt, a part of the visible and the invisible Universe. We are one.

41. 'Do not die that we may not die,' the dead cry out within you. 'We had no time to enjoy the women we desired; be in time, sleep with them! We had no time to turn our thoughts into deeds; turn them into deeds! We had no time to grasp and to crystallize the face of our hope; make it firm!' ... But you must choose with care whom to hurl down again into the chasms of your blood, and whom you shall permit to mount once more into the light and the earth.

54. The bodies breathe, feed, store up strength, and then in an erotic moment are shattered, are spent and drained utterly, that they may bequeath their spirit to their sons. What spirit? The drive upward!

87. One power descends and wants to scatter, to come to a standstill, to die. The other power ascends and strives for freedom, for immortality. These two armies, the dark and the light, the armies of life and of death, collide eternally.

104. Death's dry bones glowed with light in the erotic dark but he woke not nor felt the two warm bodies merge; the male worm then took heart and in his wife's ear whispered: 'With one sweet kiss, dear wife, we've conquered conquering Death!'

110. Death gestured with his hands and bade the king thrice welcome.

111. Her green eyes fluttered swiftly twice or thrice, then glazed, her mouth gaped open, bleating, then her jaws hung loose and retched up all her soul in lumps of clotting blood.

113. Who holds a sword is tempted, who has youth must play, he who does not fear death on earth does not fear God.

116. Blessed are those eyes that have seen more water than any man! Blessed be that haughty mind that aimed at the greatest hope! May you be blessed who row the current your life long and now with dry unfreshened lips descend to Hades to find the hidden deathless springs and slake your thirst! My son, it's death who keeps and pours the deathless waters.

124. Descend you weary-laden, descend in the dark earth, help me to finish swiftly my dread master's shroud, let each hem hold my pain, each corner hide a crow, a lean, voracious crow to peck his heart out bit by bit.

128. Two equally steep and bold paths may lead to the same peak. To act as if death did not exist, or to act thinking every minute of death, is perhaps the same thing.