“
I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell:
And by and by my Soul return'd to me,
And answer'd: 'I Myself am Heav'n and Hell
”
”
Omar Khayyám
“
I will love you as a thief loves a gallery and as a crow loves a murder, as a cloud loves bats and as a range loves braes. I will love you as misfortune loves orphans, as fire loves innocence and as justice loves to sit and watch while everything goes wrong. I will love you as a battlefield loves young men and as peppermints love your allergies, and I will love you as the banana peel loves the shoe of a man who was just struck by a shingle falling off a house. I will love you as a volunteer fire department loves rushing into burning buildings and as burning buildings love to chase them back out, and as a parachute loves to leave a blimp and as a blimp operator loves to chase after it.
I will love you as a dagger loves a certain person’s back, and as a certain person loves to wear dagger proof tunics, and as a dagger proof tunic loves to go to a certain dry cleaning facility, and how a certain employee of a dry cleaning facility loves to stay up late with a pair of binoculars, watching a dagger factory for hours in the hopes of catching a burglar, and as a burglar loves sneaking up behind people with binoculars, suddenly realizing that she has left her dagger at home. I will love you as a drawer loves a secret compartment, and as a secret compartment loves a secret, and as a secret loves to make a person gasp, and as a gasping person loves a glass of brandy to calm their nerves, and as a glass of brandy loves to shatter on the floor, and as the noise of glass shattering loves to make someone else gasp, and as someone else gasping loves a nearby desk to lean against, even if leaning against it presses a lever that loves to open a drawer and reveal a secret compartment. I will love you until all such compartments are discovered and opened, and until all the secrets have gone gasping into the world. I will love you until all the codes and hearts have been broken and until every anagram and egg has been unscrambled.
I will love you until every fire is extinguised and until every home is rebuilt from the handsomest and most susceptible of woods, and until every criminal is handcuffed by the laziest of policemen. I will love until M. hates snakes and J. hates grammar, and I will love you until C. realizes S. is not worthy of his love and N. realizes he is not worthy of the V. I will love you until the bird hates a nest and the worm hates an apple, and until the apple hates a tree and the tree hates a nest, and until a bird hates a tree and an apple hates a nest, although honestly I cannot imagine that last occurrence no matter how hard I try. I will love you as we grow older, which has just happened, and has happened again, and happened several days ago, continuously, and then several years before that, and will continue to happen as the spinning hands of every clock and the flipping pages of every calendar mark the passage of time, except for the clocks that people have forgotten to wind and the calendars that people have forgotten to place in a highly visible area. I will love you as we find ourselves farther and farther from one another, where we once we were so close that we could slip the curved straw, and the long, slender spoon, between our lips and fingers respectively.
I will love you until the chances of us running into one another slip from slim to zero, and until your face is fogged by distant memory, and your memory faced by distant fog, and your fog memorized by a distant face, and your distance distanced by the memorized memory of a foggy fog. I will love you no matter where you go and who you see, no matter where you avoid and who you don’t see, and no matter who sees you avoiding where you go. I will love you no matter what happens to you, and no matter how I discover what happens to you, and no matter what happens to me as I discover this, and now matter how I am discovered after what happens to me as I am discovering this.
”
”
Lemony Snicket
“
He pinched the name tag and ran his fingers under the letters. "Can you read this, mate? It says C-H-A-R-O-N. Say it with me: CARE-ON."
"Charon."
"Amazing! Now: Mr. Charon."
"Mr. Charon."
"Well done.
”
”
Rick Riordan (The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #1))
“
In all the institutions I try to be present and accountable for all I do and leave undone. I know that eventually I shall have to be present and accountable n the presence of God. I do not wish to be found wanting.
”
”
Maya Angelou (Letter to My Daughter)
“
Dreaming is the poetry of Life, and we must be forgiven if we indulge in it a little.
”
”
John Galsworthy (Five Speeches to P.E.N. Clubs and a Letter)
“
I have an unshaken conviction that democracy can never be undermined if we maintain our library resources and a national intelligence capable of utilizing them."
[Letter to Herbert Putnam; in: Waters, Edward N.: Herbert Putnam: the tallest little man in the world; Quarterly Journal of the Library of Congress 33:2 (April 1976), p. 171]
”
”
Franklin D. Roosevelt
“
...Je n’ai pas cessé de l’être si c’est d’être jeune que d’aimer toujours !... L’humanité n’est pas un vain mot. Notre vie est faite d’amour, et ne plus aimer c’est ne plus vivre."
(I have never ceased to be young, if being young is always loving... Humanity is not a vain word. Our life is made of love, and to love no longer is to live no longer.)
”
”
George Sand (The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters)
“
One day Trurl the constructor put together a machine that could build anything beginning with the letter 'n'.
”
”
Stanisław Lem (The Cyberiad)
“
Je sentis inconsciemment que tu mènes une double vie, une vie dont une face claire est franchement tournée vers le monde, tandis que l'autre, plongée dans l'ombre, n'est connue que de toi seul. Cette profonde dualité, le secret de ton existence
”
”
Stefan Zweig (Letter from an Unknown Woman: The Fowler Snared)
“
It made me shiver. And I about made up my mind to pray, and see if I couldn't try to quit being the kind of a boy I was and be better. So I kneeled down. But the words wouldn't come. Why wouldn't they? It warn't no use to try and hide it from Him. Nor from ME, neither. I knowed very well why they wouldn't come. It was because my heart warn't right; it was because I warn't square; it was because I was playing double. I was letting ON to give up sin, but away inside of me I was holding on to the biggest one of all. I was trying to make my mouth SAY I would do the right thing and the clean thing, and go and write to that nigger's owner and tell where he was; but deep down in me I knowed it was a lie, and He knowed it. You can't pray a lie--I found that out.
So I was full of trouble, full as I could be; and didn't know what to do. At last I had an idea; and I says, I'll go and write the letter--and then see if I can pray. Why, it was astonishing, the way I felt as light as a feather right straight off, and my troubles all gone. So I got a piece of paper and a pencil, all glad and excited, and set down and wrote:
Miss Watson, your runaway nigger Jim is down here two mile below Pikesville, and Mr. Phelps has got him and he will give him up for the reward if you send.
HUCK FINN.
I felt good and all washed clean of sin for the first time I had ever felt so in my life, and I knowed I could pray now. But I didn't do it straight off, but laid the paper down and set there thinking--thinking how good it was all this happened so, and how near I come to being lost and going to hell. And went on thinking. And got to thinking over our trip down the river; and I see Jim before me all the time: in the day and in the night-time, sometimes moonlight, sometimes storms, and we a-floating along, talking and singing and laughing. But somehow I couldn't seem to strike no places to harden me against him, but only the other kind. I'd see him standing my watch on top of his'n, 'stead of calling me, so I could go on sleeping; and see him how glad he was when I come back out of the fog; and when I come to him again in the swamp, up there where the feud was; and such-like times; and would always call me honey, and pet me and do everything he could think of for me, and how good he always was; and at last I struck the time I saved him by telling the men we had small-pox aboard, and he was so grateful, and said I was the best friend old Jim ever had in the world, and the ONLY one he's got now; and then I happened to look around and see that paper.
It was a close place. I took it up, and held it in my hand. I was a-trembling, because I'd got to decide, forever, betwixt two things, and I knowed it. I studied a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to myself:
"All right, then, I'll GO to hell"--and tore it up.
”
”
Mark Twain (The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn)
“
Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte.
”
”
Blaise Pascal
“
And L-M-N-O-P is not one letter, but five. It took me forever to figure that out.
”
”
Kim Harrison (A Fistful of Charms (The Hollows, #4))
“
[N]othing about a book is so unmistakable and so irreplaceable as the stamp of the cultured mind. I don't care what the story is about or what may be the momentary craze for books that appear to have been hammered out by the village blacksmith in a state of intoxication; the minute you get the easy touch of the real craftsman with centuries of civilisation behind him, you get literature.
”
”
Dorothy L. Sayers (The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers 1899-1936: The Making of a Detective Novelist)
“
He screwed the glass dildo as deep as it would go inside her and traced letters on her clitoris with the tip of his tongue.
P… she shuddered
R… she arched
I… she moaned
N… she gasped his name
C… “Lucien...”
E… she came
S… and came
S… and she came.
”
”
Kitty French (Knight & Play (Knight, #1))
“
In the white man's world, language, too -- and the way which the white man thinks of it--has undergone a process of change. The white man takes such things as words and literatures for granted, as indeed he must, for nothing in his world is so commonplace. On every side of him there are words by the millions, an unending succession of pamphlets and papers, letters and books, bills and bulletins, commentaries and conversations. He has diluted and multiplied the Word, and words have begun to close in on him. He is sated and insensitive; his regard for language -- for the Word itself -- as an instrument of creation has diminished nearly to the point of no return. It may be that he will perish by the Word.
”
”
N. Scott Momaday (House Made of Dawn)
“
Jeannot la bêtise des amoureux est immense, végétale, animale, astrale. Que faire? Comment te faire comprendre que je n'existe plus en dehors de toi.
”
”
Jean Cocteau (Lettres à Jean Marais)
“
We can glimpse it in the book of Acts: the method of the kingdom will match the message of the kingdom. The kingdom…goes out into the world vulnerable, suffering, praising, praying, misunderstood, misjudged, vindicated, celebrating: always – as Paul puts it in one of his letters – bearing in the body the dying of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be displayed.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church)
“
I will love you as a drawer loves a secret compartment, and as a secret compartment loves a secret, and as a secret loves to make a person gasp, and as a gasping person loves a glass of brandy to calm their nerves, and as a glass of brandy loves to shatter on the floor, and as the noise of glass shattering loves to make someone else gasp, and as someone else gasping loves a nearby desk to lean against, even if leaning against it presses a lever that loves to open a drawer and reveal a secret compartment. I will love you until all such compartments are discovered and opened, and until all the secrets have gone gasping into the world. I will love you until all the codes and hearts have been broken and until every anagram and egg has been unscrambled. I will love you until every fire is extinguished and until every home is rebuilt form the handsomest and most susceptible of woods, and until every criminal is handcuffed by the laziest of policemen. I will love you until M. hates snakes and J. hates grammar, and I will love you until C. realizes S. is not worthy of his love and N. realizes he is not worthy of the V. I will love you until the bird hates a nest and the worm hates an apple, and until the apple hates a tree and the tree hates a nest, and until a bird hates a tree and an apple hates a nest, although honestly I cannot imagine that last occurrence no matter how hard I try. I will love you as we grow older, which has just happened, and has happened again, and happened several days ago, continuously, and then several years before that, and will continue to happen as the spinning hands of every clock and the flipping pages of every calendar mark the passage of time, except for the clocks that people have forgotten to wind and the calendars that people have forgotten to place in a highly visible area. I will love you as we find ourselves farther and farther from one another, where once we were so close that we could slip the curved straw, and the long, slender spoon, between our lips and fingers respectively. I will love you until the chances of us running into one another slip from skim to zero, and until your face is fogged by distant memory, and your memory faced by distant fog, and your fog memorized by a distant face, and your distance distanced by the memorized memory of a foggy fog. I will love you no matter where you go and who you see, no matter where you avoid and who you don’t see, and no matter who sees you avoiding where you go. I will love you no matter what happens to you, and no matter how I discover what happens to you, and no matter what happens to me as I discover this, and no matter how I am discovered after what happens to me happens to me as I am discovering this. I will love you if you don’t marry me. I will love you if you marry someone else – your co-star, perhaps, or Y., or even O., or anyone Z. through A., even R. although sadly I believe it will be quite some time before two women can be allowed to marry – and I will love you if you have a child, and I will love you if you have two children, or three children, or even more, although I personally think three is plenty, and I will love you if you never marry at all, and never have children, and spend your years wishing you had married me after all, and I must say that on late, cold nights I prefer this scenario out of all the scenarios I have mentioned. That, Beatrice, is how I will love you even as the world goes on its wicked way.
”
”
Lemony Snicket (The Beatrice Letters)
“
I began to wonder if writers don’t choose to love long-distance, a sure way of blending passion and prose. The love letter seems perfectly suited to the contradiction of a writer’s life... the love letter may be the emblem of a vocation that demands solitude but desires communication.
”
”
Cathy N. Davidson
“
I remember when my daughter was just learning her letters. She was playing in her room and came downstairs to ask me, “Momma, what does C-H-I-N-A spell?” “China,” I told her (she knew what the word meant—she had friends from there). “So,” she asked next, “why is it written on everything?
”
”
Annie Leonard (The Story of Stuff: How Our Obsession with Stuff is Trashing the Planet, Our Communities, and our Health—and a Vision for Change)
“
Y
That perfect letter. The wishbone, fork in the road, empty wineglass. The question we ask over and over. Why? Me with my arms outstretched, feet in first position. The chromosome half of us don't have. Second to last in the alphabet: almost there. Coupled with an L, let's make an adverb. A modest X, legs closed. Y or N? Yes, of course. Upside-down peace sign. Little bird tracks in the sand.
Y, a Greet letter, joined the Latin alphabet after the Romans conquered Greece in the first century -- a double agent: consonant and vowel. No one used adverbs before then, and no one was happy.
”
”
Marjorie Celona (Y)
“
He thinks I'm an angel. What would an angel say?
”
”
Jahnna N. Malcolm (The Write Stuff (Love Letters, #3))
“
N'aie pas peur de mes paroles: une morte ne veut plus rien, elle ne veut ni amour, ni pitié, ni réconfort.
”
”
Stefan Zweig (Letter from an Unknown Woman and Other Stories)
“
Begin at the beginning," Miss Perkins urged. "And when you get to the end, stop.
”
”
Jahnna N. Malcolm (Mixed Messages (Love Letters, #2))
“
Salvation, then, is not “going to heaven” but “being raised to life in God’s new heaven and new earth.” But as soon as we put it like this we realize that the New Testament is full of hints, indications, and downright assertions that this salvation isn’t just something we have to wait for in the long-distance future. We can enjoy it here and now (always partially, of course, since we all still have to die), genuinely anticipating in the present what is to come in the future. “We were saved,” says Paul in Romans 8:24, “in hope.” The verb “we were saved” indicates a past action, something that has already taken place, referring obviously to the complex of faith and baptism of which Paul has been speaking in the letter so far. But this remains “in hope” because we still look forward to the ultimate future salvation of which he speaks in (for instance) Romans 5:9, 10.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church)
“
I sent my Soul through the Invisible, some letter of that After-life to spell: And by and by my Soul return’d to me, And answer’d “I Myself am Heav’n and Hell.” —Omar Khayyám, The Rubaiyat
”
”
Michael Shermer (Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time)
“
Okay, definitely should’ve just gotten our hair cut here,” Libby says, though I silently disagree, based on the dripping-blood-style letters on the sign and the fact that they spell out Curl Up N Dye.
”
”
Emily Henry (Book Lovers)
“
x, n.
Doesn’t it strike you as strange that we have a letter in the alphabet that nobody uses? It represents one-twenty-sixth of the possibility of our language, and we let it languish. If you and I really, truly wanted to change the world, we’d invent more words that started with x.
”
”
David Levithan
“
What would you say to a loved one if you had only a few seconds to impart a last message? What language does love speak?
Some of you speak love with wine and roses. For other, "I love you," is best said by breakfast in bed, carefully set aside sport sections, or night out at the movies, complete with buttered popcorn.
Children spell love T-I-M-E. So, I think, do older folks.
Teenagers spell it T-R-U-S-T. Sometimes parents spell love N-O.
But no matter what the letters, the emotion beneath the wording must be tangible, demonstrable, and sincere.
”
”
Angela Elwell Hunt (The Note)
“
Rushing toward her are all the letters of the alphabet. Each one moves in its own way, X cartwheeling over and over, C hopping forward, M and N marching stiff-legged and resolute.
”
”
Myla Goldberg (Bee Season)
“
He punished the naughty and rewarded the nice. Just like someone else who wore a lot of red. Scramble the letters in S-A-N-T-A and you get S-A-T-A-N.
”
”
Stephanie Perkins (My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories)
“
Lorsque j'ouvrais les yeux dans l'obscurité et que je te sentais contre mon flanc, je m'étonnais qu'il n'y eût pas d'étoiles au-dessus de moi, tant le ciel semblait présent.
”
”
Stefan Zweig (Letter from an Unknown Woman and Other Stories)
“
It's a four-letter word for a part of the human anatomy but it's not m-i-n-d.
”
”
Joseph Hansen (Troublemaker (Dave Brandstetter, #3))
“
Mais dons ce monde, il n'y a rien d'assure que le mort et les impots.
”
”
Benjamin Franklin (The Private Correspondence of Benjamin Franklin ...: Pt.I. Letters On Miscellaneous Subjects)
“
Là-dessus, le Père Ubu, qui n’a pas volé son repos, va essayer de dormir. Il croit que le cerveau, dans la décomposition, fonctionne au-delà de la mort et que ce sont ses rêves qui sont le Paradis.
Letter to Madame Rachilde, 1906
http://laguerretotale.blogspot.com/20...
”
”
Alfred Jarry
“
[Israel's military occupation is] in gross violation of international law and has been from the outset. And that much, at least, is fully recognized, even by the United States, which has overwhelming and, as I said, unilateral responsibility for these crimes. So George Bush No. 1, when he was the U.N. ambassador, back in 1971, he officially reiterated Washington's condemnation of Israel's actions in the occupied territories. He happened to be referring specifically to occupied Jerusalem. In his words, actions in violation of the provisions of international law governing the obligations of an occupying power, namely Israel. He criticized Israel's failure "to acknowledge its obligations under the Fourth Geneva Convention as well as its actions which are contrary to the letter and spirit of this Convention." [...] However, by that time, late 1971, a divergence was developing, between official policy and practice. The fact of the matter is that by then, by late 1971, the United States was already providing the means to implement the violations that Ambassador Bush deplored. [...] on December 5th [2001], there had been an important international conference, called in Switzerland, on the 4th Geneva Convention. Switzerland is the state that's responsible for monitoring and controlling the implementation of them. The European Union all attended, even Britain, which is virtually a U.S. attack dog these days. They attended. A hundred and fourteen countries all together, the parties to the Geneva Convention. They had an official declaration, which condemned the settlements in the occupied territories as illegal, urged Israel to end its breaches of the Geneva Convention, some "grave breaches," including willful killing, torture, unlawful deportation, unlawful depriving of the rights of fair and regular trial, extensive destruction and appropriation of property not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly. Grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, that's a serious term, that means serious war crimes. The United States is one of the high contracting parties to the Geneva Convention, therefore it is obligated, by its domestic law and highest commitments, to prosecute the perpetrators of grave breaches of the conventions. That includes its own leaders. Until the United States prosecutes its own leaders, it is guilty of grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, that means war crimes. And it's worth remembering the context. It is not any old convention. These are the conventions established to criminalize the practices of the Nazis, right after the Second World War. What was the U.S. reaction to the meeting in Geneva? The U.S. boycotted the meeting [..] and that has the usual consequence, it means the meeting is null and void, silence in the media.
”
”
Noam Chomsky
“
It reminds me of those carefree days in elementary school," Adam said, taking a sop of milk. "Where the only thing you worried about was being first on the swings, or being picked last for kickball.
”
”
Jahnna N. Malcolm (Perfect Strangers (Love Letters, #1))
“
the transliterated name and address of the addresser of the 3 letters in reversed alphabetic boustrophedonic punctated quadrilinear cryptogram (vowels suppressed) N. IGS./WI. UU. OX/W. OKS. MH/Y. IM:
”
”
James Joyce (Ulysses (Illustrated))
“
Lead me, Master of the soaring vault Of Heaven, lead me, Father, where you will. I stand here prompt and eager to obey. And ev’n suppose I were unwilling, still I should attend you and know suffering, Dishonourably and grumbling, when I might Have done so and been good as, well. For Fate The willing leads, the unwilling drags along.fn54
”
”
Seneca (Letters from a Stoic)
“
I have a little cabinet letter file on my desk that is just in front of me. I was thinking and wondering about a title for the story, and had settled on the ‘Wizard’ as part of it. My gaze was caught by the gilt letters on the three drawers of the cabinet. The first was A-G; the next drawer was labelled H-N; and on the last were the letters O-Z. And Oz it at once became.
”
”
L Frank Baum
“
ah ! tu m'as appris à comprendre bien des choses ! le visage d'une jeune fille, d'une femme, est forcément pour un homme un objet extrêmement variable ; le plus souvent, il n'est qu'un miroir, où se reflète tantôt une passion, tantôt un enfantillage, tantôt une lassitude, et il s'efface si vite, comme une image dans une glace, qu'un homme peut sans difficulté oublier le visage d'une femme, d'autant mieux que l'âge y fait alterner l'ombre et la lumière et que des costumes nouveaux l'encadrent différemment.
”
”
Stefan Zweig (Letter from an Unknown Woman and Other Stories)
“
Anne had wandered down the the Dryard's Bubble and was curled up among the ferns at the root of the n=big white birch where sher and Gilbert had so often sat ion summers gone by. Hew had gone into the newspaper office again when college was closed, and Avonlea seemed very dull without him. He never wrote to her, and Anne missed the letters that neer came. To be sure, Roy wrote twice a week; his letters were exquisite compositions which would have read beautifully in a memoir or biography. Anne felt herself more deeply in love with him that ever when she read the; but her heart never game that queer, quick, painful bound at sight of his letters which had given one day when Mrs. Hiram Sloane had handed her out an envelope addressed in Gilbert's black, upright handwriting. Anne had hurried home to the east gable and opened it eagrly--to find a typewritten copy of some college society report--"only that and nothing more." Anne flung the harmless screed across her room and sat down to write and especially nice epistle to Roy
”
”
L.M. Montgomery (Anne of the Island (Anne of Green Gables, #3))
“
J'éprouve un déchirement qui s'aggrave sans cesse, à la fois dan l'intelligence et au centre du coeur, par l'incapacité où je suis de penser ensemble dans la vérité le malheur des hommes, la perfection de Dieu et le lien entre les deux.
'I feel ceaselessly and increasingly torn, both in my intelligence and in the depth of my heart, by my inability to conceive simultaneously and in truth of the affliction of humans, the perfection of God, and the relation between the two.'
Simone Weil, Lettre à Maurice Schumann, n.d. (prb Dec. 1942)
”
”
Simone Weil (Seventy Letters: Personal and Intellectual Windows on a Thinker (Simone Weil: Selected Works))
“
[I]n a man praise is due only to what is his very own. Suppose he has a beautiful home and a handsome collection of servants, a lot of land under cultivation and a lot of money out at interest; not one of these things can be said to be in him – they are just things around him. Praise in him what can neither be given nor snatched away, what is peculiarly a man's.
You ask what that is? It is his spirit, and the perfection of his reason in that spirit.
”
”
Seneca (Letters from a Stoic)
“
The first letter was a “w,” the second an “e.” Then there was a gap. An “a” followed, then a “p,” an “o,” and an “l.” Marvin paused for a rest. After a few moments they resumed and let him see the “o,” the “g,” the “i,” the “z,” and the “e.” The next two words were “for” and “the.” The last one was a long one, and Marvin needed another rest before he could tackle it. It started with “i,” then “n,” then “c.” Next came an “o” and an “n,” followed by a “v,” an “e,” another “n,” and an “i.” After a final pause, Marvin gathered his strength for the last stretch. He read the “e,” the “n,” the “c,” and at last the final “e,” and staggered back into their arms.
”
”
Douglas Adams (The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy #1-5))
“
At the base level, it is about making connections and building relationships, but if you take the letters from networker out of the word COnNeCtworker, you are left with 4 letters. C. O. N. C. Victor, we actually talked about this at Carina’s the other day with Sheila. C. O. N. C. stands for Considering Others’ Needs Continually.
”
”
Runa Heilung
“
I made a decision a long time ago that I was going to choose joy. I even painted a big rectangle on my wall and printed it in big letters so I wouldn’t forget to make that choice every day. The major word in that rectangle isn’t joy, it’s CHOOSE. It’s looking around me when life is difficult and trading every complaint I have for something beautiful in my life that far outweighs it. I know, it’s that Pollyanna personified thing again, but living joyful beats being cynical any day of the week.
”
”
Jessica N. Turner (The Fringe Hours: Making Time for You)
“
proluctance n. the paradoxical urge to avoid doing something you've been looking forward to-opening a decisive letter, meeting up with a friend who's finally back in town, reading a new book from your favorite author-perpetually waiting around for the right state of mind, stretching out the bliss of anticipation as long as you can.
”
”
John Koenig (The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows)
“
Sometimes people have come to a crisis of conscience, perhaps having lived much of their lives without any time for God, and have then tried to twist God’s arm to be nice to them after all. That’s a poor substitute for genuine worship and love of God – though God remains gracious and merciful, and ready to welcome people however muddled they may be.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Paul for Everyone: The Pastoral Letters: 1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus (The New Testament for Everyone))
“
Considérez bien toutes les choses dont la perte nous tire des larmes et nous trouble le sens ; vous trouverez que ce qui nous afflige n’est pas tant ce que nous perdons que ce que nous croyons avoir perdu. Personne ne sent la perte que dans son imagination (opinionem). Celui qui se possède ne peut rien perdre ; mais il y en a bien peu qui sachent se posséder
”
”
Seneca (Letters from a Stoic)
“
On n'est point un homme d'esprit pour avoir beaucoup d'idées, comme on n'est pas un bon général pour avoir beaucoup de soldats.
”
”
Nicolas Chamfort (Chamfort maxims: Anecdotes, personalities, letters, historical writings, etc)
“
What 2 words do these letters represent? N W O D
”
”
Puzzleland (30 Interactive Brainteasers to Warm up your Brain)
“
I ca’n’t remember things before they happen.’ ‘It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,’ the Queen remarked.
”
”
Lewis Carroll (The Complete Works of Lewis Carroll With All the Original Illustrations + The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll: All the Novels, Stories and Poems: Alice's ... What Alice Found There + Sylvie and Brun)
“
Who can tell me what S-I-N-G stands for?” asked one of the instructors.
“Sing?” offered a girl, chewing gum. A few people snickered. Kate hoped she was joking but feared she wasn’t.
“Um, yes,” drawled the teacher, “but I meant, what do the letters stand for?”
Stomach. Instep. Nose. Groin.
A brawny boy raised his hand. “Stomach, instep, nose, groin?”
“Very good!”
Kate wanted to point out that Corsai didn’t have stomachs, insteps, noses, or groins, and if you got close enough to hit a Malchai, it would probably rip your throat out.
”
”
Victoria E. Schwab (This Savage Song (Monsters of Verity, #1))
“
C'était la première fois que je souffrais de ce sort de n'être pas reconnue de toi, ce sort qu'une vie entière j'ai subi et avec lequel je m'en vais; inconnue, toujours inconnue à tes yeux
”
”
Stefan Zweig (Letter from an Unknown Woman and Other Stories)
“
DULLARD, n. A member of the reigning dynasty in letters and life. The Dullards came in with Adam, and being both numerous and sturdy have overrun the habitable world. The secret of their power is their insensibility to blows; tickle them with a bludgeon and they laugh with a platitude. The Dullards came originally from Boeotia, whence they were driven by stress of starvation, their dullness having blighted the crops. For some centuries they infested Philistia, and many of them are called Philistines to this day. In the turbulent times of the Crusades they withdrew thence and gradually overspread all Europe, occupying most of the high places in politics, art, literature, science and theology. Since a detachment of Dullards came over with the Pilgrims in the _Mayflower_ and made a favorable report of the country, their increase by birth, immigration, and conversion has been rapid and steady. According to the most trustworthy statistics the number of adult Dullards in the United States is but little short of thirty millions, including the statisticians. The intellectual centre of the race is somewhere about Peoria, Illinois, but the New England Dullard is the most shockingly moral.
”
”
Ambrose Bierce (The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary)
“
Kyle agreed. "It would be too weird to see you in makeup and heels and all that hot stuff."
"But you just said guys like that," Hannah said.
"Right," Paul agreed. He stuck his fork back up his nose and added, "But guys are idiots.
”
”
Jahnna N. Malcolm (The Write Stuff (Love Letters, #3))
“
First, Paul is anxious that everyone who professes Christian faith should allow the gospel to transform the whole of their lives, so that the outward signs of the faith express a living reality that comes from the deepest parts of the personality. Second, he is also anxious that each Christian, and especially every teacher of the faith, should know how to build up the community in mutual love and support, rather than, by the wrong sort of teaching or behaviour, tearing it apart.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Paul for Everyone: The Pastoral Letters: 1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus (The New Testament for Everyone))
“
Whether or not the fame of Gilgamesh of Uruk had reached the Aegean – and the idea is attractive – there can be no doubt that it was as great as that of any other hero. In time his name became so much a household word that jokes and forgeries were fathered onto it, as in a popular fraud that survives on eighth-century B.C. tablets which perhaps themselves copy an older text. This is a letter supposed to be written by Gilgamesh to some other king, with commands that he should send improbable quantities of livestock and metals, along with gold and precious stones for an amulet for Enkidu, which would weigh no less that thirty pounds. The joke must have been well received, for it survives in four copies, all from Sultantepe.
”
”
N.K. Sandars (The Epic of Gilgamesh)
“
GOING to him! Happy letter! Tell him—
Tell him the page I did n’t write;
Tell him I only said the syntax,
And left the verb and the pronoun out.
Tell him just how the fingers hurried, 5
Then how they waded, slow, slow, slow;
And then you wished you had eyes in your pages,
So you could see what moved them so.
“Tell him it was n’t a practised writer,
You guessed, from the way the sentence toiled; 10
You could hear the bodice tug, behind you,
As if it held but the might of a child;
You almost pitied it, you, it worked so.
Tell him—No, you may quibble there,
For it would split his heart to know it, 15
And then you and I were silenter.
“Tell him night finished before we finished,
And the old clock kept neighing ‘day!’
And you got sleepy and begged to be ended—
What could it hinder so, to say? 20
Tell him just how she sealed you, cautious,
But if he ask where you are hid
Until to-morrow,—happy letter!
Gesture, coquette, and shake your head!
”
”
Emily Dickinson
“
We showed up.
We stood up.
We stepped forward.
We raised our right hands.
We mailed our letters home.
We shuffled, then stood in the door.
We jumped.
We walked through the fire.
We did not dodge.
We did not evade.
... We did not run.
We did not hide.
We did not leave a friend behind.
Consequently…
We have nothing to prove.
We have no stories to tell.
We have no one to convince.
Those who matter, already know.
Those who don't, never will.
We few.
We Band of Brothers.
We Moatengators...
”
”
José N. Harris
“
They found a coin and helped him to the telescope. He complained and insulted them, but they helped him look at each individual letter in turn. The first letter was a 'w,' the second an 'e.' Then there was a gap. An 'a' followed, then a 'p,' an 'o,' and an 'l.'
Marvin paused for a rest.
After a few moments they resumed and let him see the 'o,' the 'g,' the 'i,' the 'z,' and the 'e.'
The next two words were 'for' and 'the.' The last one was a long one, and Marvin needed another rest before the could tackle it.
It started with 'i,' then 'n,' then 'c.' Next came an 'o' and an 'n,' followed by a 'v,' an 'e,' another 'n,' and an 'i.'
After a final pause, Marvin gathered his strength for the last stretch.
He read the 'e,' the 'n,' the 'c,' and at last the final 'e,' and staggered back into their arms.
'I think,' he murmured at last from deep within his corroding, rattling thorax, 'I feel good about it.'
The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the very last time ever.
”
”
Douglas Adams (So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #4))
“
The wrath of God is simply the shadow side of the love of God for his wonderful creation and his amazing human creatures. Like a great artist appalled at the way his paintings have been defaced by the very people who were supposed to be looking after them, God’s implacable rejection of evil is the natural outflowing of his creative love. God’s anger against evil is itself the determination to put things right, to get rid of the corrupt attitudes and behaviors that have spoiled his world and his human creatures. It is because God loves the glorious world he has made and is utterly determined to put everything right that he is utterly opposed to everything that spoils or destroys that creation, especially the human creatures who were supposed to be the linchpins of his plan for how that creation would flourish. That’s why, as Paul’s argument progresses in this same letter, he frames its central passage not with God’s anger but with his powerful, rescuing love (Rom. 5:1–11; 8:31–39).
”
”
N.T. Wright (Simply Good News: Why the Gospel Is News and What Makes It Good)
“
Si votre vie quotidienne vous paraît pauvre, ne l'accusez pas; accusez-vous plutôt, dites-vous que vous n'êtes pas assez poète pour en convoquer les richesses.
Pour celui qui crée, il n'y a pas, en effet, de pauvreté ni de lieu indigent, indifférent.
”
”
Rainer Maria Rilke (Letters to a Young Poet)
“
This, to be sure, is not the entire truth. For there were individuals in Germany who from the very beginning of the regime and without ever wavering were opposed to Hitler; no one knows how many there were of them—perhaps a hundred thousand, perhaps many more, perhaps many fewer—for their voices were never heard. They could be found everywhere, in all strata of society, among the simple people as well as among the educated, in all parties, perhaps even in the ranks of the N.S.D.A.P. Very few of them were known publicly, as were the aforementioned Reck-Malleczewen or the philosopher Karl Jaspers. Some of them were truly and deeply pious, like an artisan of whom I know, who preferred having his independent existence destroyed and becoming a simple worker in a factory to taking upon himself the “little formality” of entering the Nazi Party. A few still took an oath seriously and preferred, for example, to renounce an academic career rather than swear by Hitler’s name. A more numerous group were the workers, especially in Berlin, and Socialist intellectuals who tried to aid the Jews they knew. There were finally, the two peasant boys whose story is related in Günther Weisenborn’s Der lautlose Aufstand (1953), who were drafted into the S.S. at the end of the war and refused to sign; they were sentenced to death, and on the day of their execution they wrote in their last letter to their families: “We two would rather die than burden our conscience with such terrible things. We know what the S.S. must carry out.” The position of these people, who, practically speaking, did nothing, was altogether different from that of the conspirators. Their ability to tell right from wrong had remained intact, and they never suffered a “crisis of conscience.” There may also have been such persons among the members of the resistance, but they were hardly more numerous in the ranks of the conspirators than among the people at large. They were neither heroes nor saints, and they remained completely silent. Only on one occasion, in a single desperate gesture, did this wholly isolated and mute element manifest itself publicly: this was when the Scholls, two students at Munich University, brother and sister, under the influence of their teacher Kurt Huber distributed the famous leaflets in which Hitler was finally called what he was—a “mass murderer.
”
”
Hannah Arendt (Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil)
“
I buy an ice-cream sandwich at the Stop-N-Go on my way home. The taste takes me back to childhood. Back when life was dreaming about things to come and believing that if you really wanted something bad enough, it could and would be yours. I remember praying for a bike for Christmas, and there it was. We prayed for Minnie's gerbil to live and it did. Later, in high school, I asked God for guidance about where to go to college, and that very day, like a kite floating straight from heaven, the acceptance letter came from UNC-Charlotte.
”
”
Alice J. Wisler (Hatteras Girl (Heart of Carolina #3))
“
Ancora una volta, rimanevo solo io. Tutti se n'erano andati, ancora una volta. E ora dovevo cercare delle lettere, raccontare, spiegare. Non è vero che l'istinto di conservazione sia una legge assoluta della vita. Vi sono dei momenti in cui la vita pesa più dell'attesa della morte.
”
”
Emilio Lussu (Un anno sull'altipiano)
“
I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell:
And by and by my Soul return'd to me,
And answer'd "I Myself am Heav'n and Hell:"
Heav'n but the Vision of fulfill'd Desire,
And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire,
Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves,
So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.
We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In Midnight by the Master of the Show;
But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays
Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days;
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes,
But Here or There as strikes the Player goes;
And He that toss'd you down into the Field,
He knows about it all — He knows — HE knows!
”
”
Omar Khayyám (رباعيات خيام)
“
A une époque de sa vie, il y avait de cela de nombreuses années, elle avait perdu sa foi en Dieu. Elle l'avait maudit, haï, accusé d'être responsable de tous les maux de la terre. Mais le mal n'était pas une création de Dieu. L'homme avait inventé le mal. Finalement, elle avait réussi à pardonner à Dieu.
”
”
Barbara Taylor Bradford (Letter from a Stranger)
“
but all he can think is a supercut of other people’s letters they’ve quietly sent to each other. Words that went down in history. “Meet you in every dream … Keep most of your heart in Washington … Miss you like a home … We two longing loves … My young king.”\n\nOne day, he tells himself. One day, us too.
”
”
Casey McQuiston (Red, White & Royal Blue)
“
From his beach bag the man took an old penknife with a red handle and began to etch the signs of the letters onto nice flat pebbles. At the same time, he spoke to Mondo about everything there was in the letters, about everything you could see in them when you looked and when you listened. He spoke about A, which is like a big fly with its wings pulled back; about B, which is funny, with its two tummies; or C and D, which are like the moon, a crescent moon or a half-full moon; and then there was O, which was the full moon in the black sky. H is high, a ladder to climb up trees or to reach the roofs of houses; E and F look like a rake and a shovel; and G is like a fat man sitting in an armchair. I dances on tiptoes, with a little head popping up each time it bounces, whereas J likes to swing. K is broken like an old man, R takes big strides like a soldier, and Y stands tall, its arms up in the air, and it shouts: help! L is a tree on the river's edge, M is a mountain, N is for names, and people waving their hands, P is asleep on one paw, and Q is sitting on its tail; S is always a snake, Z is always a bolt of lightning, T is beautiful, like the mast on a ship, U is like a vase, V and W are birds, birds in flight; and X is a cross to help you remember.
”
”
J.M.G. Le Clézio (Mondo et autres histoires)
“
John Marshall Clemens’s land purchases and the family’s subsequent sales of the land have been only partly documented from independent sources. The extant grants, deeds, and bills of sale are incomplete, but it was also the case that contradictory or inaccurate deeds often led to disputed claims. Orion Clemens referred to one cause of such conflict in a letter to his brother on 7 July 1869, alleging that “Tennessee grants the same land over and over again to different parties” (OC to SLC, 7 July 1869, CU-MARK, quoted in 3? July 1869 to OC, L3, 279 n. 1 [bottom]; for family correspondence on the subject from 1853 to 1870, see L1, L2, L3, and L4).
”
”
Mark Twain (Autobiography of Mark Twain: The Complete and Authoritative Edition, Volume 1)
“
Ceux qui reprochent à nos ancêtres d'avoir été sottement crédules oublient, d'abord qu'on peut également être sottement incrédule, et ensuite qu'en fait de crédulité, il n'y a rien de tel que les illusions dont vivent les soi-disant destructeurs d'illusions ; car on peut remplacer une crédulité simple par une crédulité compliquée [...]
”
”
Frithjof Schuon (Light on the Ancient Worlds: A New Translation with Selected Letters (Library of Perennial Philosophy))
“
Paul Gauguin’s remark about his friend Van Gogh is not without interest: “Il oubliait même,” wrote the famous painter of négresses, “d’écrire le hollandais, et comme on a pu voir par la publication de ses lettres à son frère, il n’écrivait jamais qu’en français, et cela admirablement, avec des ‘Tant qu’à, Quant à,’ à n’en plus finir.”[1]
”
”
Vincent van Gogh (The Letters of a Post-Impressionist : Being the Familiar Correspondence of Vincent Van Gogh by Van Gogh)
“
Your conclusions are, I think, justified," he said. "Ulick Norman Owen! In Miss Brent's letter, though the signature of the surname is a mere scrawl the Christian names are reasonably clear-Una Nancy -in either case, you notice, the same initials. Ulick Norman OwenUna Nancy Owen-each time, that is to say, U. N. Owen. Or by a slight stretch of fancy, UNKNOWN!
”
”
Agatha Christie (And Then There Were None)
“
Dr. Fauci worked with Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and other social media sites to muzzle discussion of any remedies. FDA sent a letter of warning that N-acetyle-L-cysteine (NAC) cannot be lawfully marketed as a dietary supplement, after decades of free access on health food shelves, and suppressed IV vitamin C, which the Chinese were using with extreme effectiveness.
”
”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health)
“
When people in churches today discuss Paul and his letters, they often think only of the man of ideas who dealt with lofty and difficult concepts, implying a world of libraries, seminar rooms, or at least the minister’s study for quiet sermon preparation. We easily forget that the author of these letters spent most of his waking hours with his sleeves rolled up, doing hard physical work in a hot climate, and that perhaps two-thirds of the conversations he had with people about Jesus and the gospel were conducted not in a place of worship or study, not even in a private home, but in a small, cramped workshop. Saul had his feet on the ground, and his hands were hardened with labor. But his head still buzzed with scripture and the news about Jesus.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Paul: A Biography)
“
If you have ever wondered why radio and television stations always have call signs beginning with W or K, the answer is that those letters were assigned to American airwaves by an international convention held in London in 1912. The United States was given the call letters A, N, W, and K. A and N were reserved respectively for the army and navy. The other two were given to public broadcasters.
”
”
Bill Bryson (Made in America)
“
He imagined a town called A. Around the communal fire they’re shaping arrowheads and carving tributes o the god of the hunt. One day some guys with spears come over the ridge, perform all kinds of meanness, take over, and the new guys rename the town B. Whereupon they hang around the communal fire sharpening arrowheads and carving tributes to the god of the hunt. Some climatic tragedy occurs — not carving the correct tributary figurines probably — and the people of B move farther south, where word is there’s good fishing, at least according to those who wander to B just before being cooked for dinner. Another tribe of unlucky souls stops for the night in the emptied village, looks around at the natural defenses provided by the landscape, and decides to stay awhile. It’s a while lot better than their last digs — what with the lack of roving tigers and such — plus it comes with all the original fixtures. they call the place C, after their elder, who has learned that pretending to talk to spirits is a fun gag that gets you stuff. Time passes. More invasions, more recaptures, D, E, F, and G. H stands as it is for a while. That ridge provides some protection from the spring floods, and if you keep a sentry up there you can see the enemy coming for miles. Who wouldn’t want to park themselves in that real estate? The citizens of H leave behind cool totems eventually toppled by the people of I, whose lack of aesthetic sense if made up for by military acumen. J, K, L, adventures in thatched roofing, some guys with funny religions from the eastern plains, long-haired freaks from colder climes, the town is burned to the ground and rebuilt by still more fugitives. This is the march of history. And conquest and false hope. M falls to plague, N to natural disaster — same climatic tragedy as before, apparently it’s cyclical. Mineral wealth makes it happen for the O people, and the P people are renowned for their basket weaving. No one ever — ever — mentions Q. The dictator names the city after himself; his name starts with the letter R. When the socialists come to power they spend a lot of time painting over his face, which is everywhere. They don’t last. Nobody lasts because there’s always somebody else. They all thought they owned it because they named it and that was their undoing. They should have kept the place nameless. They should have been glad for their good fortune, and left it at that. X, Y, Z.
”
”
Colson Whitehead (Apex Hides the Hurt)
“
Tacite se moquait des Germains qui tentaient d'arrêter un torrent avec leur boucliers ; ce n'est pourtant pas plus naïf que de croire à l'émigration planétaire, ou de croire à l'installation, avec des moyens purement humains, d'une société humaine définitivement satisfaite et parfaitement inoffensive, et continuant indéfiniment à progresser. Tout cela prouve que l'homme, s'il est forcément devenu moins naïf pour certaines choses, n'a pourtant rien appris quant à l'essentiel, pour dire le moins ; la seule chose dont l'homme livré à lui-même soit capable, c'est de "faire les péchés les plus anciens de la manière la plus nouvelle", comme dirait Shakespeare. Et le monde étant ce qu'il est, ce n'est sans doute pas commettre un truisme que d'ajouter qu'il vaut mieux aller naïvement au Ciel que d'aller intelligemment en enfer.
”
”
Frithjof Schuon (Light on the Ancient Worlds: A New Translation with Selected Letters (Library of Perennial Philosophy))
“
the Platonized eschatology so popular over many centuries (how will my soul get to heaven?) has played host to a moralized anthropology (what’s to be done about my sin?), generating a quasi-pagan soteriology (God killed Jesus instead of punishing me).11 This has been assumed to be what Paul was saying in these letters. More specifically, when people express “faith” in this line of thought, they are assured that they are therefore forgiven and heaven-bound. This, it has been assumed, is what Paul meant by “justification.” One can see a low-grade version of this when young persons, moved by a sermon or perhaps by an apologetic argument, say a prayer of Christian commitment and are thereupon informed that they are now “justified by faith,” that they are therefore going to heaven, and that they must not try to supplement this pure, justifying “faith” either with moral effort or with religious ritual.
”
”
N.T. Wright (Galatians (Commentaries for Christian Formation (CCF)))
“
Remember that craze a few years back in the BookWorld for sending chain letters? Receive a letter and send one on to ten friends? Well, someone has been overenthusiastic with the letter U—I’ve got a report here from the Text Sea Environmental Protection Agency saying that reserves of the letter U have reached dangerously low levels—we need to decrease consumption until stocks are brought back up. Any suggestions?” “How about using a lower-case n upside down?” said Benedict. “We tried that with M and W during the great M Migration of ’62; it never worked.” “How about respelling what, what?” suggested King Pellinore, stroking his large white mustache. “Any word with the our ending could be spelt or, don’tchaknow.” “Like neighbor instead of neighbour?” “It’s a good idea,” put in Snell. “Labor, valor, flavor, harbor—there must be hundreds. If we confine it to one geographical area, we can claim it as a local spelling idiosyncrasy.
”
”
Jasper Fforde (The Well of Lost Plots (Thursday Next, #3))
“
What did we talk about?
I don't remember. We talked so hard and sat so still that I got cramps in my knee. We had too many cups of tea and then didn't want to leave the table to go to the bathroom because we didn't want to stop talking. You will think we talked of revolution but we didn't. Nor did we talk of our own souls. Nor of sewing. Nor of babies. Nor of departmental intrigue. It was political if by politics you mean the laboratory talk that characters in bad movies are perpetually trying to convey (unsuccessfully) when they Wrinkle Their Wee Brows and say (valiantly--dutifully--after all, they didn't write it) "But, Doctor, doesn't that violate Finagle's Constant?" I staggered to the bathroom, released floods of tea, and returned to the kitchen to talk. It was professional talk. It left my grey-faced and with such concentration that I began to develop a headache. We talked about Mary Ann Evans' loss of faith, about Emily Brontë's isolation, about Charlotte Brontë's blinding cloud, about the split in Virginia Woolf's head and the split in her economic condition. We talked about Lady Murasaki, who wrote in a form that no respectable man would touch, Hroswit, a little name whose plays "may perhaps amuse myself," Miss Austen, who had no more expression in society than a firescreen or a poker. They did not all write letters, write memoirs, or go on the stage. Sappho--only an ambiguous, somewhat disagreeable name. Corinna? The teacher of Pindar. Olive Schriener, growing up on the veldt, wrote on book, married happily, and ever wrote another. Kate Chopin wrote a scandalous book and never wrote another. (Jean has written nothing.). There was M-ry Sh-ll-y who wrote you know what and Ch-rl-tt- P-rk-ns G-lm-an, who wrote one superb horror study and lots of sludge (was it sludge?) and Ph-ll-s Wh--tl-y who was black and wrote eighteenth century odes (but it was the eighteenth century) and Mrs. -nn R-dcl-ff- S-thw-rth and Mrs. G--rg- Sh-ld-n and (Miss?) G--rg-tt- H-y-r and B-rb-r- C-rtl-nd and the legion of those, who writing, write not, like the dead Miss B--l-y of the poem who was seduced into bad practices (fudging her endings) and hanged herself in her garter. The sun was going down. I was blind and stiff. It's at this point that the computer (which has run amok and eaten Los Angeles) is defeated by some scientifically transcendent version of pulling the plug; the furniture stood around unknowing (though we had just pulled out the plug) and Lady, who got restless when people talked at suck length because she couldn't understand it, stuck her head out from under the couch, looking for things to herd. We had talked for six hours, from one in the afternoon until seven; I had at that moment an impression of our act of creation so strong, so sharp, so extraordinarily vivid, that I could not believe all our talking hadn't led to something more tangible--mightn't you expect at least a little blue pyramid sitting in the middle of the floor?
”
”
Joanna Russ (On Strike Against God)
“
Le Vieillissement sera mon adieu à l'adolescence, mon renoncement à ce que Deleuze-Guattari appelleront « l'illimitation du désir » et que Georges Bataille appelait « l'omnitude du possible » que l'on n'approche que par le refus indéfini de toute détermination : la volonté de n'être Rien se confond avec celle d'être Tout. À la fin du Vieillissement se trouve cette auto-exhortation : "Il faut accepter d'être fini : d'être ici et nulle part ailleurs, de faire ça et pas autre chose, maintenant et non jamais ou toujours […] d'avoir cette vie seulement.
”
”
André Gorz (Letter to D: A Love Story)
“
Dylan, my man!" Kyle Martinez jogged up from the direction of the parking lot and slapped Dylan on the back. "Is Hannah giving you the 4-1-1 on Red Rocks? This girl knows it all."
"Yeah," chimed in Paul Hume, who had appeared on Dylan's other side. "It's hard to believe that someone so hot could have brains, too!"
Kyle made an over exaggerated point at Hannah from behind his hand as he whispered to Dylan, "Major hottie."
"Hottie!" Colby repeated as he joined the gang gathered on the front lawn. "Are you guys talking about Hannah Banana? She, like, defines the word babe.
”
”
Jahnna N. Malcolm (The Write Stuff (Love Letters, #3))
“
Onomasticians and toponymists have a field day with this book. Of particular interest to language fiends, and to this translator, is Zamyatin’s relationship to the sounds of words. He told the artist Yuri Annenkov of the qualities he ascribes to certain sounds and letters. L is pale, cold, light blue, liquid, light. R is loud, bright, red, hot, fast. N is tender, snow, sky, night. D or T is stifling, grave, foggy, obscuring, stagnant. M is kind, soft, motherly, sea-like. A is wide, distant, ocean, misty mirage, breadth of scope. O is high, deep, sea-like, bosom. I is close, low, pressing.
”
”
Yevgeny Zamyatin (We)
“
So I got lucky. But then again, it took me many hundreds of rejections to manage to find that luck.
I am sure there is a lesson n that somewhere.
Someone had taken a punt and had faith in me. I wouldn’t let them down, and I would be eternally grateful to them for giving me that chance to shine.
Once DLE were on board, a few other companies joined them. It’s funny how, once one person backs you, somehow other people feel more comfortable doing the same.
I guess most people don’t like to trailblaze.
So before I knew it, suddenly, from nothing, I had the required funds for a place on the team. (In fact I was about £600 short, but Dad helped me out on that one, and refused to hear anything about ever being paid back. Great man.)
The dream of an attempt on Everest was now about to become a reality.
So many people over the years have asked me how to get sponsorship, but there is only one magic ingredient. Action. You just have to keep going.
Then keep going some more.
Our dreams are just wishes, if we never follow them through with action. And in life, you have got to be able to light your own fire.
The reality of planning big expeditions is often tedious and frustrating. There is no glamour in yet another potential sponsor’s rejection letter, and I have often felt my own internal fire flickering close to snuff point.
Action is what keeps it alight.
”
”
Bear Grylls (Mud, Sweat and Tears)
“
TO MY BELOVED,
Its neither a piece of paper nor a letter, rather it's my small heart which I'm gifting it to you darling.It seems time stood still without ur presence around me. My days and nights have gone worthless. All my heart could do is to recall the memories of time which we have spend together. My heart gets rejoiced whenever your beautiful face comes before my eyes. Your mesmerizing eyes drive me to another world. Your flowing hair looks tantalizing and your rosy lips seems to be meant only for saying lovely words.
While having a cup of coffee yesterday, numerous moments striked my heart. Our first meeting, when you were looking like a fairy in white salwar-suit. Still fresh in my mind, your pretty smile and bowing your head down to laugh with your hand on your lips. I confess that your every action was stealing my heart and I couldn't withdraw myself from lookig you.
The gift you presented me on my birthday gives me a sigh of relief that you are always there with me. Sweetheart, In the classroom, I cracked useless jokes and PJ's just to see your charming smile. Kept gazing your lips, just to heat some golden words. You had stolen my heart.
Dedicated '' I don't know when and how you arrived in my life,
Don't know when my heart star beating for you, day n night....
My eyes kept staring the window pane,
Wishing one day u'll come in my lane....
Darling you're the only one whom I admire,
It's you whom my heart desperately desires...
Being with you is my only need,
You are now the medicine of my heartbeat...
I Craved your name on my heart,
The day when I decided not to loose you ever,
And I promise you sweetheart that,
I love you & i'll love you for ever, ever n ever......
It's true my baby that, i love you like anything. Miss you from very morning 2 the night. MY senses are active to feel you, to hear you, to see you, to taste every sorrow and happiness of your life. Jaana, get embedded in me, in my soul so that i can live with you, for you........
Dying to have your reply.....
Truly Your's
PK
”
”
Prabhat Kumar
“
In his letter of 23 October 1928 Warnie wrote of a sea voyage to Hong Kong. ‘The most interesting person on board,’ he said, ‘was the Chief Engineer who was a character straight out of Kipling–such a man as I had always believed never existed outside novels…I first came across him one night after dinner when a few of us collected in the saloon for a mouthful of the port, and McAndrew’s Hymn being mentioned, he expressed his warmest approval of it…This and some more chat led to an invitation to adjourn to his room and inspect “ma buiks”. It was a severe shock after a discussion on Kipling to arrive at his room and come bolt under a withering collection of philosophy–Spencer, Comte, and similar books. I had to mumble something about having no philosophy, which was met with “When ye say ye haaaave no pheelawsophy, Cap’n, ye only mean ye haaave a bad pheelawsophy.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume 1: Family Letters, 1905-1931)
“
harbinger, n.
When I was in third grade, we would play that game at recess where you’d twist an apple while holding on to its stem, reciting the alphabet, one letter for each turn. When the stem broke, the name of your true love would be revealed. Whenever I played, I always made sure that the apple broke at K. At the time I was doing this because no one in my grade had a name that began with K. Then, in college, it seemed like everyone I fell for was a K. It was enough to make me give up on the letter, and I didn’t even associate it with you until later on, when I saw your signature on a credit card receipt, and the only legible letter was that first K. I will admit: When I got home that night, I went to the refrigerator and took out another apple. But I stopped twisting at J and put the apple back. You see, I didn’t trust myself. I knew that even if the apple wasn’t ready, I was going to pull that stem
”
”
David Levithan (The Lover's Dictionary)
“
De nos jours, tout le monde veut paraître intelligent ; on aimerait mieux être taxé de criminel que de naïf, si cela pouvait se faire sans risques. Mais comme l'intelligence ne se tire pas du vide, on a recours à des subterfuges : l'un des plus courants est la manie de la "démystification", qui permet d'avoir l'air intelligent à peu de frais, car il suffit de dire que la réaction normale vis-à-vis de tel phénomène est un "préjugé" et qu'il est grand temps de le présenter en dehors de la "légende" ; si on pouvait soutenir que l'océan est un étang et l'Himalaya une colline, on le ferait. Il est impossible à certains auteurs de se borner à constater, comme tout le monde l'a fait avant eux, que telle chose ou tel homme eut telles qualités et tel destin ; il faut toujours commencer par faire remarquer qu'"on a trop dit que..." et que la réalité est tout autre, et qu'on l'a enfin découverte, et qu'auparavant tout le monde était dans le "mensonge". On applique ce stratagème surtout à des choses évidentes et universellement connues ; ce serait par trop naïf sans doute de reconnaître en deux mots qu'un lion est un carnivore et qu'il n'est pas tout à fait sans danger.
”
”
Frithjof Schuon (Light on the Ancient Worlds: A New Translation with Selected Letters (Library of Perennial Philosophy))
“
The robot could no longer lift his head, had not read the message. They lifted his head, but he complained that his vision circuits had almost gone.
They found a coin and helped him to the telescope. He complained and in-sulted them, but they helped him look at each individual letter in turn, The first letter was a “w”, the second an “e”. Then there was a gap. An “a”
followed, then a “p”, an “o” and an “l”.
Marvin paused for a rest.
After a few moments they resumed and let him see the “o”, the “g”, the “i”, the “s” and the “e”.
The next two words were “for” and “the”. The last one was a long one, and Marvin needed another rest before he could tackle it.
It started with an “i”, then “n” then a “c”. Next came an “o” and an “n”, followed by a “v”, an “e”, another “n” and an “i”. After a final pause, Marvin gathered his strength for the last stretch. He read the “e”, the “n”, the “c” and at last the final “e”, and staggered back into their arms.
“I think,” he murmured at last, from deep within his corroding rattling thorax,
“I feel good about it.”
The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the very last time ever.
Luckily, there was a stall nearby where you could rent scooters from guys with
green wings.
”
”
Douglas Adams (So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #4))
“
The robot
could no longer lift his head, had not read the message. They lifted his head,
but he complained that his vision circuits had almost gone.
They found a coin and helped him to the telescope. He complained and in-
159
sulted them, but they helped him look at each individual letter in turn, The
first letter was a “w”, the second an “e”. Then there was a gap. An “a”
followed, then a “p”, an “o” and an “l”.
Marvin paused for a rest.
After a few moments they resumed and let him see the “o”, the “g”, the “i”,
the “s” and the “e”.
The next two words were “for” and “the”. The last one was a long one, and
Marvin needed another rest before he could tackle it.
It started with an “i”, then “n” then a “c”. Next came an “o” and an “n”,
followed by a “v”, an “e”, another “n” and an “i”.
After a final pause, Marvin gathered his strength for the last stretch.
He read the “e”, the “n”, the “c” and at last the final “e”, and staggered back
into their arms.
“I think,” he murmured at last, from deep within his corroding rattling thorax,
“I feel good about it.”
The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the very last time ever.
Luckily, there was a stall nearby where you could rent scooters from guys with
green wings.
”
”
Douglas Adams (So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #4))
“
N.E.W.T. Level Questions 281-300: What house at Hogwarts did Moaning Myrtle belong to? Which dragon did Viktor Krum face in the first task of the Tri-Wizard tournament? Luna Lovegood believes in the existence of which invisible creatures that fly in through someone’s ears and cause temporary confusion? What are the names of the three Peverell brothers from the tale of the Deathly Hallows? Name the Hogwarts school motto and its meaning in English? Who is Arnold? What’s the address of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes? During Quidditch try-outs, who did Ron beat to become Gryffindor’s keeper? Who was the owner of the flying motorbike that Hagrid borrows to bring baby Harry to his aunt and uncle’s house? During the intense encounter with the troll in the female bathroom, what spell did Ron use to save Hermione? Which wizard, who is the head of the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry of Magic lost his son in 1995? When Harry, Ron and Hermione apparate away from Bill and Fleur’s wedding, where do they end up? Name the spell that freezes or petrifies the body of the victim? What piece did Hermione replace in the game of Giant Chess? What bridge did Fenrir Greyback and a small group of Death Eaters destroy in London? Who replaced Minerva McGonagall as the new Deputy Headmistress, and became the new Muggle Studies teacher at Hogwarts? Where do Bill and Fleur Weasley live? What epitaph did Harry carve onto Dobby’s grave using Malfoy’s old wand? The opal neckless is a cursed Dark Object, supposedly it has taken the lives of nineteen different muggles. But who did it curse instead after a failed attempt by Malfoy to assassinate Dumbledore? Who sends Harry his letter of expulsion from Hogwarts for violating the law by performing magic in front of a muggle? FIND THE ANSWERS ON THE NEXT PAGE! N.E.W.T. Level Answers 281-300 Ravenclaw. Myrtle attended Hogwarts from 1940-1943. Chinese Firebolt. Wrackspurts. Antioch, Cadmus and Ignotus. “Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus” and “Never tickle a sleeping dragon.” Arnold was Ginny’s purple Pygmy Puff, or tiny Puffskein, bred by Fred and George. Number 93, Diagon Alley. Cormac McLaggen. Sirius Black. “Wingardium Leviosa”. Amos Diggory. Tottenham Court Road in London. “Petrificus Totalus”. Rook on R8. The Millenium Bridge. Alecto Carrow. Shell Cottage, Tinworth, Cornwall. “HERE LIES DOBBY, A FREE ELF.” Katie Bell. Malfalda Hopkirk, the witch responsible for the Improper use of Magic Office.
”
”
Sebastian Carpenter (A Harry Potter Quiz for Muggles: Bonus Spells, Facts & Trivia (Wizard Training Handbook (Unofficial) 1))
“
Every entry, whether revised or reviewed, goes through multiple editing passes. The definer starts the job, then it’s passed to a copy editor who cleans up the definer’s work, then to a bunch of specialty editors: cross-reference editors, who make sure the definer hasn’t used any word in the entry that isn’t entered in that dictionary; etymologists, to review or write the word history; dating editors, who research and add the dates of first written use; pronunciation editors, who handle all the pronunciations in the book. Then eventually it’s back to a copy editor (usually a different one from the first round, just to be safe), who will make any additional changes to the entry that cross-reference turned up, then to the final reader, who is, as the name suggests, the last person who can make editorial changes to the entry, and then off to the proofreader (who ends up, again, being a different editor from the definer and the two previous copy editors). After the proofreaders are done slogging through two thousand pages of four-point type, the production editors send it off to the printer or the data preparation folks, and then we get another set of dictionary pages (called page proofs) to proofread. This process happens continuously as we work through a dictionary, so a definer may be working on batches in C, cross-reference might be in W, etymology in T, dating and pronunciation in the second half of S, copy editors in P (first pass) and Q and R (second pass), while the final reader is closing out batches in N and O, proofreaders are working on M, and production has given the second set of page proofs to another set of proofreaders for the letter L. We all stagger our way through the alphabet until the last batch, which is inevitably somewhere near G, is closed. By the time a word is put in print either on the page or online, it’s generally been seen by a minimum of ten editors. Now consider that when it came to writing the Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition, we had a staff of about twenty editors working on it: twenty editors to review about 220,000 existing definitions, write about 10,000 new definitions, and make over 100,000 editorial changes (typos, new dates, revisions) for the new edition. Now remember that the 110,000-odd changes made were each reviewed about a dozen times and by a minimum of ten editors. The time given to us to complete the revision of the Tenth Edition into the Eleventh Edition so production could begin on the new book? Eighteen months.
”
”
Kory Stamper (Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries)
“
When a general examination of the rhyme scheme in the Qur'an is
made, we see that around 80% of the rhymes consist of just three
sounds (n, m, a) consisting of the letters Alif, Mim, Ya and Nun258.
Excluding the letter "Nun," 30% of the verses are rhymed with "Mim,"
"Alif" or "Ya."
The formation of rhymed prose with just two or three sounds in a
poem of 200-300 lines may give that work an important quality, sufficient
for it to be described as a masterpiece by literary critics today.
However, bearing in mind the length of the Qur'an, the information it
contains and its wise exposition, the extraordinary manner in which its
rhymed prose system is used becomes even clearer and more beautiful.
The Qur'an indeed contains an ocean of information relating to a wide
variety of subjects. They include: religious and moral guidance, lessons
from the lives of the peoples of the past, the message of the prophets
and messengers of Allah, the physical sciences and historical accounts
of important events. But all of this, although wonderful in itself, is
delivered with the most fantastic literary rhythm and excellence. It is
simply not possible for so much rhymed prose by use of so few sounds
in the Qur'an, with its varied and knowledgeable subject matter, to be
achieved by human endeavour. From that point of view, it is not surprising
that Arab linguists describe the Qur'an as "very definitely inimitable.
”
”
Harun Yahya (Allah's Miracles in the Qur'an)
“
When other birds are still, the screech owls take up the strain, like mourning women their ancient u-lu-lu. Their dismal scream is truly Ben Jonsonian.( Wise midnight hags! It is no honest and blunt tu-whit tu-who of the poets, but, without jesting, a most solemn graveyard ditty, the mutual consolations of suicide lovers remembering the pangs and the delights of supernal love in the infernal groves. Yet I love to hear their wailing, their doleful responses, trilled along the woodside; reminding me sometimes of music and singing birds; as if it were the dark and tearful side of music, the regrets and sighs that would fain be sung. They are the spirits, the low spirits and melancholy forebodings, of fallen souls that once in human shape night-walked the earth and did the deeds of darkness, now expiating their sins with their wailing hymns or threnodies in the scenery of their transgressions. They give me a new sense of the variety and capacity of that nature which is our common dwelling. Oh-o-o-o-o that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! sighs one on this side of the pond, and circles with the restlessness of despair to some new perch on the gray oaks. Then — that I never had been bor-r-r-r-n! echoes another on the farther side with tremulous sincerity, and — bor-r-r-r-n! comes faintly from far in the Lincoln woods.
I was also serenaded by a hooting owl. Near at hand you could fancy it the most melancholy sound in Nature, as if she meant by this to stereotype and make permanent in her choir the dying moans of a human being — some poor weak relic of mortality who has left hope behind, and howls like an animal, yet with human sobs, on entering the dark valley, made more awful by a certain gurgling melodiousness — I find myself beginning with the letters gl when I try to imitate it — expressive of a mind which has reached the gelatinous, mildewy stage in the mortification of all healthy and courageous thought. It reminded me of ghouls and idiots and insane howlings. But now one answers from far woods in a strain made really melodious by distance — Hoo hoo hoo, hoorer hoo; and indeed for the most part it suggested only pleasing associations, whether heard by day or night, summer or winter.
I rejoice that there are owls. Let them do the idiotic and maniacal hooting for men. It is a sound admirably suited to swamps and twilight woods which no day illustrates, suggesting a vast and undeveloped nature which men have not recognized. They represent the stark twilight and unsatisfied thoughts which all have. All day the sun has shone on the surface of some savage swamp, where the double spruce stands hung with usnea lichens, and small hawks circulate above, and the chickadee lisps amid the evergreens, and the partridge and rabbit skulk beneath; but now a more dismal and fitting day dawns, and a different race of creatures awakes to express the meaning of Nature there.
”
”
Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
“
BEST FRIENDS SHOULD BE TOGETHER
We’ll get a pair of those half-heart necklaces so every ask n’ point reminds us we are one glued duo. We’ll send real letters like our grandparents did, handwritten in smart cursive curls. We’ll extend cell plans and chat through favorite shows like a commentary track just for each other. We’ll get our braces off on the same day, chew whole packs of gum. We’ll nab some serious studs but tell each other everything. Double-date at a roadside diner exactly halfway between our homes. Cry on shoulders when our boys fail us. We’ll room together at State, cover the walls floor-to-ceiling with incense posters of pop dweebs gone wry. See how beer feels. Be those funny cute girls everybody’s got an eye on. We’ll have a secret code for hot boys in passing. A secret dog named Freshman Fifteen we’ll have to hide in the rafters during inspection. Follow some jam band one summer, grooving on lawns, refusing drugs usually. Get tattoos that only spell something when we stand together. I’ll be maid of honor in your wedding and you’ll be co-maid with my sister but only cause she’d disown me if I didn’t let her. We’ll start a store selling just what we like. We’ll name our firstborn daughters after one another, and if our husbands don’t like it, tough. Lifespans being what they are, we’ll be there for each other when our men have passed, and all the friends who come to visit our assisted living condo will be dazzled by what fun we still have together. We’ll be the kind of besties who make outsiders wonder if they’ve ever known true friendship, but we won’t even notice how sad it makes them and they won’t bring it up because you and I will be so caught up in the fun, us marveling at how not-good it never was.
”
”
Gabe Durham (Fun Camp)
“
By collecting data from the vast network of doctors across the globe, they added dozens of new compounds to the arsenal—all proven effective against COVID-19. Dr. Kory told me that he was deeply troubled that the extremely successful efforts by scores of front-line doctors to develop repurposed medicines to treat COVID received no support from any government in the entire world—only hostility—much of it orchestrated by Dr. Fauci and the US health agencies. The large universities that rely on hundreds of millions in annual funding from NIH were also antagonistic. “We didn’t have a single academic institution come up with a single protocol,” said Dr. McCullough. “They didn’t even try. Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Duke, you name it. Not a single medical center set up even a tent to try to treat patients and prevent hospitalization and death. There wasn’t an ounce of original research coming out of America available to fight COVID—other than vaccines.” All of these universities are deeply dependent on billions of dollars that they receive from NIH. As we shall see, these institutions live in terror of offending Anthony Fauci, and that fear paralyzed them in the midst of the pandemic. “Dr. Fauci refused to promote any of these interventions,” says Kory. “It’s not just that he made no effort to find effective off-the-shelf cures—he aggressively suppressed them.” Instead of supporting McCullough’s work, NIH and the other federal regulators began actively censoring information on this range of effective remedies. Doctors who attempted merely to open discussion about the potential benefits of early treatments for COVID found themselves heavily and inexplicably censored. Dr. Fauci worked with Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and other social media sites to muzzle discussion of any remedies. FDA sent a letter of warning that N-acetyle-L-cysteine (NAC) cannot be lawfully marketed as a dietary supplement, after decades of free access on health food shelves, and suppressed IV vitamin C, which the Chinese were using with extreme effectiveness.
”
”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health)
“
Cherchez en vous-mêmes. Explorez la raison qui vous commande d'écrire; examinez si elle plonge ses racines au plus profond de votre cour; faites-vous cet aveu : devriez-vous mourir s'il vous était interdit d'écrire. Ceci surtout : demandez-vous à l'heure la plus silencieuse de votre nuit; me faut-il écrire ? Creusez en vous-mêmes à la recherche d'une réponse profonde. Et si celle-ci devait être affirmative, s'il vous était donné d'aller à la rencontre de cette grave question avec un fort et simple "il le faut", alors bâtissez votre vie selon cette nécessité; votre vie, jusqu'en son heure la plus indifférente et la plus infime, doit être le signe et le témoignage de cette impulsion. Puis vous vous approcherez de la nature. Puis vous essayerez, comme un premier homme, de dire ce que vous voyez et vivez, aimez et perdez. N'écrivez pas de poèmes d'amour; évitez d'abord les formes qui sont trop courantes et trop habituelles : ce sont les plus difficiles, car il faut la force de la maturité pour donner, là où de bonnes et parfois brillantes traditions se présentent en foule, ce qui vous est propre. Laissez-donc les motifs communs pour ceux que vous offre votre propre quotidien; décrivez vos tristesses et vos désirs, les pensées fugaces et la foi en quelque beauté. Décrivez tout cela avec une sincérité profonde, paisible et humble, et utilisez, pour vous exprimer, les choses qui vous entourent, les images de vos rêves et les objets de votre souvenir. Si votre quotidien vous paraît pauvre, ne l'accusez pas; accusez-vous vous-même, dites-vous que vous n'êtes pas assez poète pour appeler à vous ses richesses; car pour celui qui crée il n'y a pas de pauvreté, pas de lieu pauvre et indifférent. Et fussiez-vous même dans une prison dont les murs ne laisseraient parvenir à vos sens aucune des rumeurs du monde, n'auriez-vous pas alors toujours votre enfance, cette délicieuse et royale richesse, ce trésor des souvenirs ? Tournez vers elle votre attention. Cherchez à faire resurgir les sensations englouties de ce vaste passé; votre personnalité s'affirmera, votre solitude s'étendra pour devenir une demeure de douce lumière, loin de laquelle passera le bruit des autres." (Lettres à un jeune poète)
”
”
Rainer Maria Rilke (Letters to a Young Poet)