All Quotes By Tag: Books

“ ‘Paradise Lost’ was printed in an edition of no more than 1,500 copies and transformed the English language. Took a while. Wordsworth had new ideas about nature: Thoreau read Wordsworth, Muir read Thoreau, Teddy Roosevelt read Muir, and we got a lot of national parks. Took a century. What poetry gives us is an archive, the fullest existent archive of what human beings have thought and felt by the kind of artists who loved language in a way that allowed them to labor over how you make a music of words to render experience exactly and fully.”

“It is when we are faced with death that we turn most bookish.”

“With slouch and swing around the ringWe trod the Fools’ Parade!We did not care: we knew we wereThe Devils’ Own Brigade:And shaven head and feet of leadMake a merry masquerade.”

“In fiction, the characters have their own lives. They may start as a gloss on the author’s life, but they move on from there. In poetry, especially confessional poetry but in other poetry as well, the poet is not writing characters so much as emotional truth wrapped in metaphor. Bam! Pow! A shot to the gut.”

“I wasn’t reading poetry because my aim was to work my way through English Literature in Prose A–Z.But this was different.I read [in, Murder in the Cathedral by T.S. Eliot]: This is one moment, / But know that another / Shall pierce you with a sudden painful joy.I started to cry.(…)The unfamiliar and beautiful play made things bearable that day, and the things it made bearable were another failed family—the first one was not my fault, but all adopted children blame themselves. The second failure was definitely my fault.I was confused about sex and sexuality, and upset about the straightforward practical problems of where to live, what to eat, and how to do my A levels.I had no one to help me, but the T.S. Eliot helped me.So when people say that poetry is a luxury, or an option, or for the educated middle classes, or that it shouldn’t be read at school because it is irrelevant, or any of the strange and stupid things that are said about poetry and its place in our lives, I suspect that the people doing the saying have had things pretty easy. A tough life needs a tough language—and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers—a language powerful enough to say how it is.It isn’t a hiding place. It is a finding place.”

“I won’t be sad too often,If they bury me in the libraryWith bookworms in my coffin.”

“That’s it then. This is how it ends. I haven’t even read Proust.”

“I’m not courting death; I’ve far too many books left to read.”

“The Author To Her BookThou ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain,Who after birth did’st by my side remain,Till snatcht from thence by friends, less wise than true,Who thee abroad exposed to public view,Made thee in rags, halting to th’ press to trudge,Where errors were not lessened (all may judge).At thy return my blushing was not small,My rambling brat (in print) should mother call.I cast thee by as one unfit for light,The visage was so irksome in my sight,Yet being mine own, at length affection wouldThy blemishes amend, if so I could.I washed thy face, but more defects I saw,And rubbing off a spot, still made a flaw.I stretcht thy joints to make thee even feet,Yet still thou run’st more hobbling than is meet.In better dress to trim thee was my mind,But nought save home-spun cloth, i’ th’ house I find.In this array, ‘mongst vulgars may’st thou roam.In critic’s hands, beware thou dost not come,And take thy way where yet thou art not known.If for thy father askt, say, thou hadst none;And for thy mother, she alas is poor,Which caused her thus to send thee out of door.”

“He presses his mouth to mine. I nearly pass out from the surge of passion that washes through me. “What I’m telling you is…” he tightens his grip around my arms. “You belong to me,” he whispers.” FUNNY, ADDICTIVE DRAMA “Dancing on My Own.”

“Fran,” dad says lifting his eyes from the map as he nonchalantly drops the A-bomb on me. “It’s extra-terrestrial.” “Wait… what?” I can’t believe what I just heard. “You mean aliens, right?” My breath seizes. “From another world?”FUNNY, ADDICTIVE DRAMA ”

“Fran,” dad says lifting his eyes from the map as he nonchalantly drops the A-bomb on me. “It’s extra-terrestrial.” “Wait… what?” I can’t believe what I just heard. “You mean aliens, right?” My breath seizes. “From another world?”FUNNY, ADDICTIVE DRAMA “Dancing on My Own.”

“My heart is pounding so crazy fast, I can barely breathe. I feel faint.And Just as I think he’s going for my lips. I brace myself for a hot, wet, romantickiss. He leans in and presses his lips to my forehead. “Ready to go?” he asks.”

“My heart is pounding so crazy fast, I can barely breathe. I feel faint.And Just as I think he’s going for my lips. I brace myself for a hot, wet, romantickiss. He leans in and presses his lips to my forehead. “Ready to go?” he asks.” FUNNY, ADDICTIVE DRAMA “Dancing on My Own.”

“He presses his mouth to mine. I nearly pass out from the surge of passion that washes through me. “What I’m telling you is…” he tightens his grip around my arms. “You belong to me,” he whispers.”