read > read's Quotes

“If I’d stayed there, would I always have been happy? No, I suppose not. People move away, grow older, die, and the bright belief that there will be another marvelous thing around each corner fades. It is now or never; we must snatch at happiness as it flies.”
― J.L. Carr, A Month in the Country

“If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.”
― Mark Twain

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America

“We've gone on holiday by mistake”
― Bruce Robinson, Withnail and I: the Original Screenplay

“It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit.”
― Noël Coward, Blithe Spirit

“The sun had come up brilliantly after a heavy rain, and the trees were glistening and very wet. On some impulse, plain exuberance, I suppose, the fellow jumped up and caught hold of a branch, and a storm of luminous water came pouring down on the two of them, and they laughed and took off running, the girl sweeping water off her hair and her dress as if she were a little bit disgusted, but she wasn’t. It was a beautiful thing to see, like something from a myth. I don’t know why I thought of that now, except perhaps because it is easy to believe in such moments that water was made primarily for blessing, and only secondarily for growing vegetables or doing the wash. I wish I had paid more attention to it. My list of regrets may seem unusual, but who can know that they are, really. This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.”
― Marilynne Robinson, Gilead

“Reader, I married him. A quiet wedding we had: he and I, the parson and clerk, were alone present.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“I wanted you to see something about her—I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do. Mrs. Dubose won, all ninety-eight pounds of her. According to her views, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew.”
― Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

“Hell is—other people!”
― Jean-Paul Sartre, No Exit

“How, unless you drink as I do, could you hope to understand the beauty of an old Indian woman playing dominoes with a chicken?”
― Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano

“The movements of some more little red birds in the garden, like animated rosebuds, appeared unbearably jittery and thievish. It was as though the creatures were attached by sensitive wires to his nerves.”
― Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano

“Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.”
― Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary

“It looks rather ordinary," said the Snork. "Unless you consider that a top hat is always somewhat extraordinary, of course.”
― Tove Jansson, Finn Family Moomintroll

“Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.”
― Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

“Bees blew like cake-crumbs through the golden air, white butterflies like sugared wafers, and when it wasn't raining a diamond dust took over which veiled and yet magnified all things”
― Laurie Lee, Cider with Rosie

“I hadn't the heart to touch my breakfast. I told Jeeves to drink it himself.”
― P.G. Wodehouse

“Welcome to Glasgow - the city where we punch people who are on fire.”
― Frankie Boyle

“Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liverslices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencods' roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine.”
― James Joyce, Ulysses

“I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.”
― Jerome K. Jerome

“I foresee no possibility of venturing into themes showing a closer view of reality for a long time to come. The public itself will not have it. What it wants is a gun and a girl.”
― D.W. Griffith

“The secret of being a bore is to tell everything.”
― Voltaire

“When the seagulls follow the trawler, it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea. ”
― Eric Cantona

“Mother died today. Or maybe yesterday; I can't be sure.”
― Albert Camus, The Stranger

“Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come.”
― Matt Groening, The Big Book of Hell

“Love me. Love my umbrella.”
― James Joyce, Giacomo Joyce

“My favorite animal is steak.”
― Fran Lebowitz

“I love you like a fat kid loves cake!”
― Scott Adams

“Police work wouldn't be possible without coffee," Wallander said.
"No work would be possible without coffee."
They pondered the importance of coffee in silence.”
― Henning Mankell, One Step Behind

“I get to go to overseas places, like Canada.”
― Britney Spears

“War does not determine who is right — only who is left.”
― Anonymous