If somebody from the past doesn't rise up from the grave and start talking to me, I haven't got a book. I have to hear that voice, the voice of the narrator. How she sounds will tell me who she is, and who she is will tell me how she will act - and that starts the plot in motion. ~Geraldine Brooks
#quotes #geraldine-brooks #books #past

But that's typical of me. "This is going to end in tears," I tell myself every time I balance a cup of coffee on the upholstered arm of the chair I'm sitting on. And then, lo and behold, the cup topples and even before it lands, I tell myself, "Told me so!" Not to spell out, or spill out, one of the metaphors of my life, but I always do the stupid thing and then I do it again. I never learn. ~Patricia Marx
#quotes #patricia-marx #weeping #stupidity

In truth, one cannot, it seems, oppose mechanism and finalism, one cannot oppose mechanism and anthropomorphism, for if the functioning of a machine is explained by relations of pure causality, the construction of a machine can be understood neither without purpose nor without man. A machine is made by man and for man, with a view toward certain ends to be obtained, in the form of effects to be produced, a mechanical model of any phenomena is explanatory only so long as we take machines as already granted. ~Georges Canguilhem
#quotes #georges-canguilhem #machines

Edgar Allan Poe is considered the great writer of horror stories, perhaps the greatest, I will say the greatest. ~William Friedkin
#quotes #william-friedkin #edgar-allan-poe #writing #stories

I have never been carried around by a large boy, or laughed until my stomach hurt at the dinner table, or listened to the clamor of a hundred people all talking at once. Peace is restrained, this is free. ~Veronica Roth
#quotes #veronica-roth

The sight of women talking together has always made men uneasy nowadays it means rank subversion. ~Germaine Greer
#quotes #germaine-greer #women #men #talking

I love therapy! There's nothing like talking to someone who has no emotional tie to your life. ~Eva Mendes
#quotes #eva-mendes #therapy #emotions

That which God said to the rose, and caused it to laugh in full-blown beauty, He said to my heart, and made it a hundred times more beautiful. ~Rumi
#quotes #rumi #god #flower #beauty

Will is stronger than fact; it can mold and overcome fact. ~H. G. Wells
#quotes #h-g-wells #wish #hardship

We believe that civilization has been created under the pressure of the exigencies of life at the cost of satisfaction of the instincts. ~Sigmund Freud
#quotes #sigmund-freud #civilization #instincts

Words, words, words! They shut one off from the universe. Three quarters of the time one is never in contact with things, only with the beastly words that stand for them. ~Aldous Huxley
#quotes #aldous-huxley #language #definition

I was never one to go up to someone as a five- or six-year-old and say, "Hello, my name's Paul, will you be my friend?" But I found if I did an impression of the PE teacher or whatever and people laughed, then they did like me, and so then they started talking to me, rather than me making the initial overture and then maybe being rebuffed. ~Paul Merton
#quotes #paul-merton #teaching

The Jews are the living embodiment of the minority, the constant reminder of what duties societies owe their minorities, whoever they might be. ~Abba Eban
#quotes #abba-eban #minorities #jewish

Children see things very well sometimes, and idealists even better. ~Lorraine Hansberry
#quotes #lorraine-hansberry #children #idealists

Movements are as eloquent as words. ~Isadora Duncan
#quotes #isadora-duncan #sports #language

At the age of 25, I gave up my study of Japanese language and culture at university in Brisbane and moved to the town of Alice Springs. ~Robyn Davidson
#quotes #robyn-davidson

I was dyslexic, so I was put in the silly class at school. ~David Bailey
#quotes #david-bailey #schooling #dyslexic

Language in art remains a highly ambiguous transaction, a quicksand, a trampoline, a frozen pool which might give way under you; at any time. ~Harold Pinter
#quotes #harold-pinter #art #language

Now you're selling out, the devil sold a dream and you bought it without thinking about. How the beast will decrease the brain wave, with material thoughts from the crib to the grave. ~Kool Moe Dee
#quotes #kool-moe-dee #evil #dream #death

The tragedy of ignorance is its complacency. ~Robert Quillen
#quotes #robert-quillen #ignorance

I watched her for a long time, memorizing her shoulders, her long-legged gait. This was how girls left. They packed up their suitcases and walked away in high heels. They pretended they weren't crying, that it wasn't the worst day of their lives. That they didn't want their mothers to come running after them, begging their forgiveness, that they wouldn't have gone down on their knees and thanked god if they could stay. ~Janet Fitch
#quotes #janet-fitch

A philosopher is, no doubt, entitled to examine even those distinctions that are to be found in the structure of all languages; in that case, such a distinction may be imputed to a vulgar error, which ought to be corrected in philosophy. ~Thomas Reid
#quotes #thomas-reid #philosophy #errors

For boredom speaks the language of time, and it is to teach you the most valuable lesson of your life, the lesson of your utter insignificance. ~Joseph Brodsky
#quotes #joseph-brodsky #boredom #life #time #language

A narrow neck keeps the bottle from being emptied in one swig. ~Irish Proverb
#proverbs #irish-proverbs #reason

Faith is a continuum, and we each fall on that line where we may. ~Dan Brown
#quotes #dan-brown