Bright Young Things discussion
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'Do you like India?' Mrs. Bristow asked me.'Oh, yes. I think it's marvellous.'
'And what do you think of the people.'
'I like them very much, and think them most interesting.'
'Oo, aren't you a fibber! What was it you said the other day about "awful Anglo-Indian chatter"?'
'But I thought you were speaking of the Indians just now, not the Anglo-Indians.'
'The Indians! I never think of them.'
'Well, you said "the people," you know'
'I meant US people, stupid!'
'I see. Well, let's start again.'
I adore this passage from J. R. Ackerley's "Hindoo Holiday: An Indian Journal" (1932) - in fact, I adore the enitre book. Waugh called it "Radiantly delightful" in The Observer.
Mod
Here is an extract from "Mrs.Dalloway" by Virginia Woolf. I like it because I agree with the sentiments expressed, that although people turn to love and religion for solace, th..."
Mrs Dalloway is one of my favourite books - I love the way Woolf has made the inner thoughts of an ageing social hostess profound and interesting. Like in the passage you've quoted, there is a great deal of depth there in the seemingly banal detail and milieu.
Ally
"The other drew his host's attention to the doorway, where a young man in form-fitting tweeds had just appeared. The aspect of this young man was haggard. His eyes glared wildly and he sucked at an empty cigarette-holder. If he had a mind, there was something on it."From Uncle Fred Flits by by P G Wodehouse. Love it!!!!
“The brain may take advice, but not the heart, and love, having no geography, knows no boundaries: weight and sink it deep, no matter, it will rise and find the surface: and why not? Any love is natural and beautiful that lies within a person’s nature; only hypocrites would hold a man responsible for what he loves, emotional illiterates and those of righteous envy, who, in their agitated concern, mistake so frequently the arrow pointing to heaven for the one that leads to hell.” - page 148 of “Other Voices, Other Rooms” (1948)
by Truman Capote
“Never love a wild thing, Mr. Bell,” Holly advised him. “That was Doc’s mistake. He was always lugging home wild things. A hawk with a hurt wing. One time it was a full-grown bobcat with a broken leg. But you can’t give your heart to a wild thing: the more you do, the stronger they get. Until they’re strong enough to run into the woods. Or fly into a tree. Then a taller tree. If you let yourself love a wild thing. You’ll end up looking at the sky.”- page 74 “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (1958)
By Truman Capote
Loving all the contributions - I think this thread is such a great idea!
Mod
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things. The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault. Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only beauty.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.
The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass. The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.
No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style.
No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.
Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's craft is the type.
All art is at once surface and symbol.
Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.
Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.
When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself.
We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.
-- OSCAR WILDE - Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray.
This has to be my favourite piece from all literature!
Ally
Look at all those monkeysJumping in their cage
Why don't they all go out to work
And earn a decent wage?
How can you say such silly things,
Are you a son of mine?
Imagine monkeys travelling on
The Moredon-Edgeware line!
But what about the Pekinese!
They have an allocation.
Don't travel during the Peke hour',
It says on every station.
My Gosh, you're right, my clever boy
I never thought of that!
And so they left the monkey house,
While an elephant raised his hat.
Spike Milligan
Quote from Ally: "The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass. The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass."the entire passage is incredibly thought-provoking, but I particularly like those lines!
Love Is Not All: It Is Not Meat nor DrinkEdna St. Vincen Millay
Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,
Or nagged by want past resolution's power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.
(1931)
Fini wrote: "Love Is Not All: It Is Not Meat nor DrinkEdna St. Vincen Millay
Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And ris..."
Just lovely. Edna is my Goddess; there is no one like her.
Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,--no,
Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair
Than small white single poppies,--I can bear
Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though
From left to right, not knowing where to go,
I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there
Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear
So has it been with mist,--with moonlight so.
Like him who day by day unto his draught
Of delicate poison adds him one drop more
Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten,
Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed
Each hour more deeply than the hour before,
I drink--and live--what has destroyed some men.
Mod
Ivan wrote: "Edna is my Goddess; there is no one like her."I love her too! Though I have not read many of her poems, every one of them I have read somehow made a lasting impression - gave me a moment of utter awe.
btw: just noticed that I misspelled her name - sorry, sloppy typing :/
Some keep the Sabbath going to church; I keep it staying at home,
With a Bobolink for a chorister,
And an Orchard for a dome
Some keep the Sabbath in surplice;
I just wear my Wings
And instead of tolling the bell for Church,
Our little sexton sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman
And the sermon is never long;
So instead of getting to heaven at last,
I'm going all along!
- Emily Dickinson.
This poem has always held special meaning for me, for I find God in nature, the "splendour in the grass" and the "glory in the flower" (Wordsworth), and have always had problems with organized religion and dogma.
"'I read, I think,' she said to Norman, 'because one has a duty to find out what people are like,' a trite enough remark of which Norman took not much notice, feeling himself under no such obligation and reading purely for pleasure, not enlightenment, though part of the pleasure was the enlightenment, he could see that. But duty did not come into it."The Uncommon Reader: A Novella by Alan Bennett (page 30).
"Make your own Bible. Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your readings have been to you like the blast of a trumpet." — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Lindz wrote: ""The other drew his host's attention to the doorway, where a young man in form-fitting tweeds had just appeared. The aspect of this young man was haggard. His eyes glared wildly and he sucked at ..."Ivan, I love your two (Capote and Emerson) - for years, I've kept a journal of quotes, snippets of words that speak to me. When an author speaks and expresses what I've felt but can't put into words...I can go back to them years later and they still speak to me. Great idea, Ally!
Mod
Mod
Ally wrote: "If anyone finds a passage in the books they are reading that seem wonderful or say something worth repeating please use this thread to share it with everyone!"Ally, I have attached a link to a wonderful site for author interviews. Here is one with E. M. Forster. There are many interviews to explore.
I had downloaded and printed this one a while ago.
http://www.theparisreview.org/intervi...
I just found this one with Evelyn Waugh
http://www.theparisreview.org/intervi...
I love this passage from The Return of the Soldier. The hero has returned from the Western Front shellshocked and has lost his memory, and his wife wants him "cured"; if he is he'll return to the front. “What’s the use of talking? You can’t cure him,” – she caught her lower lip with her teeth and fought back from the brink of tears, – “make him happy, I mean. All you can do is to make him ordinary.”
“I grant you that’s all I do,” he said. ..”It’s my profession to bring people... to the normal. There seems to be a general feeling it’s the place where they ought to be. Sometimes I don’t see the urgency myself.”
Bright Young Things
Books mentioned in this topic
The Return of the Soldier (other topics)The Uncommon Reader (other topics)
Uncle Fred Flits by (other topics)
1. an anthology or collection of brief extracts or writings.
2. an anthology of good writing from the best writers for imitation
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I thought that we could start our own little anthology thread containing brief extracts of our favourite books from 1900-1945.
Feel free to use this thread to share your 'best bits' with the rest of the Bright Young Things. Extracts that make you laugh, extracts that make you cry, extracts that you find thought provoking or that changed your world view, extracts where the writing is simply breathtaking, where a character is particularly well wrought, a piece of scenery so inspiring or an emotion so well captured... In short - anything that marks out the great literature of this period for you and that you'd like to share with others.
Happy hunting!
Ally