Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Poetry is a section of river-fog and moving boat-lights, delivered between bridges and whistles, so one says, 'Oh!' and another, 'How?'
Why do I find the fantasy - husband, family, kids - exhausting instead of alluring? Is there something wrong with me? Do I have a life?
Comparing Asian writers mainly to other Asian writers implies that we're all telling the same story - a disappointingly reductive view.
If you see harassment happening, speak up. Being harassed is terrible; having bystanders pretend they don't notice is infinitely worse.
There is a revolution coming. It will not be like revolutions of the past. It will originate with the individual and with culture . . .
Emulation looks out for merits, that she may exalt herself by a victory; envy spies out blemishes that she may lower another by defeat.
Sensibility would be a good portress if she had but one hand; with her right she opens the door to pleasure, but with her left to pain.
I had considered how the things that never happen, are often as much realities to us, in their effects, as those that are accomplished.
Cows are my passion. What I have ever sighed for has been to retreat to a Swiss farm, and live entirely surrounded by cows - and china.
... As to sleep, you know, I never sleep now. I might be a Watchman, except that I don't get any pay, and he's got nothing on his mind.
Some people have a knack of putting upon you gifts of no real value, to engage you to substantial gratitude. We thank them for nothing.
Tis well to be merry and wise, 'Tis well to be honest and true; It is best to be off with the old love, Before you are on with the new.
I'm an individual. I do not want to get into a pissing match with an organization that is a de-facto gigadollar-turnover multinational!
If there was no New Orleans, America would just be a bunch of free people dying of boredom." -Judy Deck in an e-mail sent to Chris Rose
If women were the equals of men, men would no longer equal themselves. Why then should women resemble what men would have ceased to be?
You know, there's a 12 step program for gambling. You should look into that. Twelve steps. Coyote laughed. I'll bet I can do it in six.
That's the difference between irony and sarcasm. Irony can be spontaneous, while sarcasm requires volition. You have to create sarcasm.
So hey, once Joshua heals your brother, you want to go do something, get some pomegranate juice, a falafel,or get married or something?
I thought I was going to be a horror story writer. My influences were horror writers, like Rich Matheson, Ray Bradbury and Bram Stoker.
What I want is to live of that initial and primordial something that was what made some things reach the point of aspiring to be human.
Much of what we see in the universe ... starts out as imaginary. Often you must imagine something before you can come to terms with it.
I have never written anything in one draft, not even a grocery list, although I have heard from friends that this is actually possible.
Aging has brought me greater liberty in fiction. When I was young I was harder on myself. I wrote with an idea of absolute seriousness.
I always worry that knowing too much about a novel or a story early on in writing will close it down - it feels fatalistic in some way.
Class clowns are never allowed to date anybody decent, but you don't get beaten up, you're invited to parties, and everybody likes you.
Alas the Church of England! What with Popery on one hand, and schismatics on the other, how has she been crucified between two thieves!
We will always have more to discover, more to invent, more to understand and that's much closer to art and literature than any science.
Every culture has contributed to maths just as it has contributed to literature. It's a universal language; numbers belong to everyone.
What you do with your billable time determines your current income, but what you do with your non-billable time determines your future.
The way the function dictates the form... elegant lines... nothing extraneous... this shoe perfectly expresses the essence of shoeness.
Hundreds,' Joe says. 'Hundreds and hundreds. But then again, I'm old.' So old, Jesus was in your math class,' I say. I crack myself up.
Learn from the past, set vivid, detailed goals for the future,and live in the only moment of time over which you have any control: now.
A man is whole only when he takes into account his shadow as well as himself - and what is a man's shadow but his upright astonishment?
There's a connection between the advances that are made in technology and the sense of primitive fear people develop in response to it.
The modern meaning of life's end-when does it end? How does it end? How should it end? What is the value of life? How do we measure it?
Past, present and future are not amenities of language. Time unfolds into the seamsof being. It passes through you, making and shaping.
That's the thing about December: it goes by you in a flash. If you just close your eyes, it's gone. And it's like you were never there.
Still when I lost her, I lost sight of any landmark that might have led me someplace happier, to some more populated or congenial life.
A language that takes our emotions seriously and gives them real weight in our lives encourages us to think and be and act differently.
The only magic we have is what we make in ourselves, the muscles we build up on the inside, the sense of belief we create from nothing.
[O]ne can scarcely be frightened off writing what one wants to write for fear an obscure reviewer should patronise one on that account.
All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others.
The Lorax: Which way does a tree fall? The Once-ler: Uh, down? The Lorax: A tree falls the way it leans. Be careful which way you lean.
It is by all odds the loftiest of cities. It even managed to reach the highest point in the sky at the lowest moment of the depression.
There is something that is much more scarce, something finer far, something rarer than ability. It is the ability to recognize ability.
Yesterday woman was a chattel. Now she is, in law, a minor. Tomorrow she will be free, or partially so--that is to say, as free as man.
Rome is ... an impossible compounding of time, in which no century has respect for any other and all hit you in a jumble at every turn.
If you handed [character] a glass that was 90% full, he'd tell you that the 10% empty part proved that no one really cared about water.
I wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow was the Final Dawn, the last sunrise before the Earth and Sun are reshaped into computing elements.
Over the years, I have come to realize that no matter how satisfying fiction is, it becomes that much better when it actually happened.