Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Literature bores me, especially great literature
To me, characters are at the heart of great literature.
The myth that everyone once read great literature is just a myth.
I get upset about what is taken as great literature and what is cute and exotic.
Great literature is simply language charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.
I think you can find all the elements that you can find in great literature in mundane experiences.
Hopefully, reading and being around great literature inspires me to write songs, but I'm not sure about that.
When I was a kid, I went through the whole process of reading great literature and trying to be very widely read.
I'm not writing great literature. I'm writing commercial fiction for people to enjoy the stories and to like the characters.
What is wonderful about great literature is that it transforms the man who reads it towards the condition of the man who wrote.
In India, not enough importance is given to writing for children. And what could be more important than the enrichment of young minds with great literature?
And in down times it shakes a lot of the bad SF out, a lot the stuff that was bought for literary reasons, which is neither entertaining nor great literature.
It's what's missing, I think, from most music - the rebellious part. That rebelliousness is part of great rock music or great literature or any great creative stuff.
Of course the illusion of art is to make one believe that great literature is very close to life, but exactly the opposite is true. Life is amorphous, literature is formal.
Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.
When I read great literature, great drama, speeches, or sermons, I feel that the human mind has not achieved anything greater than the ability to share feelings and thoughts through language.
Great literature must spring from an upheaval in the author's soul. If that upheaval is not present then it must come from the works of any other author which happens to be handy and easily adapted.
No one bothered reading the books and understanding - and again, I'm not being high-falutin' about it - but I think our books are great literature with great metaphors of real life dealing with fears and hopes.
I never wanted to become an actress because I'd read great literature or seen great Shakespeare. It was more just wanting to understand what the people were really like, why they said all the strange things they did.
I take a certain pride in having maintained a reputation for fast copy throughout my newspaper career. Fast-breaking stories left my typewriter in a hurry. Not great literature, perhaps, but fast, and usually accurate.
The idea behind a dish - the delight and the surprise - makes a difference. Great literature surprises and delights, and provokes us. It isn't just 'Here's the facts - boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl.' It's how you tell it.
Novelists get to say plenty in their massive tomes; rock singers only get four-minute songs with two verses and a chorus' worth of lyrics, and so there's a real pleasure in accessing the intelligence behind the music, even if it doesn't qualify as 'great literature.'