Timing Quotes (page 456)
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I had come to know the singular power of a river advancing toward the open sea and the power of tides regulating that advance. . . . Because I had seen this for the first time over the year, I could not be intimidated by guys who wore expensive shoes and flashy ties. Piedmont could fire me, bawl me out, abuse me, put it on my record that I was an incorrigible son of a bitch, make sure I never taught in South Carolina again, or cut off my teacher's pension. That was all he could do. His...
Pat Conroy
I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.
Smedley Butler
No born Londoner (it is different with people of Scotch or Irish origin) now says 'bloody,' unless he is a man of some education. The word has, in fact, moved up in the social scale and ceased to be a swear word for the purposes of the working classes. The current London adjective, now tacked on to every noun, is -----. No doubt in time -----, like 'bloody,' will find its way into the drawing room and replaced by some other word.
George Orwell
Teddy looked at him directly for the first time.
Are you a poet?' he asked.
A poet?' Nicholson said. 'Lord, no. Alas, no. Why do you ask?'
I don't know. Poets are always taking the weather so personally. They're always sticking their emotions in things that have no emotions.' "
- Teddy and Nicholson in "Teddy" (Nine Stories)
J. D. Salinger
You come out; it is still dark. The door creaks, or perhaps you sneeze, or the snow crunches under your foot, and hares start up from the far cabbage patch and leap away, leaving the snow criss-crossed with tracks. In the distance dogs begin to howl and it takes a long time before the quieten down. The cocks have finished their crowing and have nothing left to say. Then dawn breaks.
Boris Pasternak
That's coral!" she cried in astonishment. "We must be down in the deeps of the sea!"Well, wasn't that what you wanted?" said the trout. "I thought you wished you could see the sea!"I did," said Jane, looking very surprised. "But I never expected the wish to come true."Great oceans! Why bother to wish it then? I call that simply a waste of time. But come on! Mustn't be late for the party!
P. L. Travers
Once you have mathematical certainty there is nothing left to do or to understand. There will be nothing left but to bottle up your five senses and plunge into contemplation. While if you stick to consciousness, even though the same result is attained, you can at least flog yourself at times, and that will, at any rate, liven you up. Reactionary as it is, corporal punishment is better than nothing.
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Love
That’s it:
The cashless commerce.
The blanket always too short.
The loose connexion.
To search behind the horizon.
To brush fallen leaves with four shoes
and in one’s mind to rub bare feet.
To let and rent hearts;
or in a room with shower and mirror,
in a hired car, bonnet facing the moon,
wherever innocence stops
and burns its programme,
the word in falsetto sounds
different and new each time.
Today, in front of a box office not yet open,
hand in hand crackled
the hangdog old man and...
Gunter Grass