quote · Legacy record
Whereas I think: I’m lying here in a haystack... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitesimal in comparison with the rest of space, which I don’t occupy and which has no relation to me. And the period of time in which I’m fated to live is so insignificant beside the eternity in which I haven’t existed and won’t exist... And yet in this atom, this mathematical point, blood is circulating, a brain is working, desiring something... What chaos! What a farce!
Whereas I think: I’m lying here in a haystack... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitesimal in comparison with the rest of space, which I don’t occupy and which has no relation to me. And the period of time in which I’m fated to live is so insignificant beside the eternity in which I haven’t existed and won’t exist... And yet in this atom, this mathematical point, blood is circulating, a brain is working, desiring something... What chaos! What a farce!
Approximate author period: c. 1834 AD · industrial
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- Author or tradition
- Ivan Turgenev
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
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- Approximate author period: c. 1834 AD · industrial
Approximate author-period evidence for Ivan Turgenev: documented activity in 1834. Wikidata Q42831, inspected 2026-10-08. Not a quotation composition date or independent verification of attribution. Source: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42831 (accessed 2026-10-08).
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 11190; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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