Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, who ever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life. A tree says: A kernel is ...
Hannibal Lecter: First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does he do, this man you seek? Clarice Starling: He kills women... Hannibal Lecter: No. That is...
O-Ren Ishii: [after she cuts off Tanaka's head, in Japanese] So you all will know the seriousness of my warning, I shall say this in English. O-Ren Ishii: [in English] As your leader, I encourage you from time to time, and always in a respectful mann...
Perry: We gotta move her somewhere. You got gloves? Harry: Excuse me? Perry: Gloves. Do you have gloves? You have to move her. If it's a frame-up, some asshole's probably calling the cops on you right now. Do this: wrap up the body in a blanket, a sh...
Magneto: His name is Colonel William Stryker, and he invaded your mansion for one purpose: he wanted Cerebro, or enough of it to build one of his own. Dr. Jean Grey: But that doesn't make any sense. Stryker would need the Professor to operate it. Mag...
Q: Where and when do you do your writing? A: Any small room with no natural light will do. As for when, I have no particular schedules... afternoons are best, but I'm too lethargic for any real regime. When I'm in the flow of something I can do a reg...
I may enter a zone of transcendence, in which I marvel at all the accidents of fate, since the beginning of life on earth, that led to my genes being created and my standing in this particular garden in a contemplative and imagining mind. I’ve been...
Every war and conflict that the United States enters has its own ROE [rules of engagement]. Contrary to what most people think, the U.S. military does not have a complete license to kill, even in wartime. We are not a barbaric state, and we do not en...
If a painting really works down in your heart and changes the way you see, and think, and feel, you don't think, 'oh, I love this picture because it's universal.' 'I love this painting because it speaks to all mankind.' That's not the reason anyone l...
Keep thinking back about what Mum said about being real and the Velveteen Rabbit book (though frankly have had enough trouble with rabbits in this particular house). My favorite book, she claims of which I have no memory was about how little kids get...
Falling in love, we said; I fell for him. We were falling women. We believed in it, this downward motion: so lovely, like flying, and yet at the same time so dire, so extreme, so unlikely. God is love, they once said, but we reversed that, and love, ...
The most important thing I learned on Tralfamadore was that when a person dies he only appears to die. He is still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly for people to cry at his funeral. All moments, past, present and future, always have e...
The sky [above Tehran] was like a star-eaten black blanket, and so far as I could read them its constellations were unfamiliar. Lawrence speaks somewhere of drawing 'strength from the depths of the universe'; Malcolm Lowry speaks about the deadness o...
This kind of action is a prevalent error among oppressed peoples. It is based upon the false notion that there is only a limited and particular amount of freedom that must be divided up between us, with the largest and juiciest pieces of liberty goin...
This week in live current events: your eyes. All power can be dangerous: Direct or alternating, you, socket to me. Plugged in and the grid is humming, this electricity, molecule-deep desire: particular friction, a charge strong enough to stop a heart...
Andy Dufresne: Red. If you ever get out of here, do me a favor. Red: Sure, Andy. Anything. Andy Dufresne: There's a big hayfield up near Buxton. You know where Buxton is? Red: Well, there's... there's a lot of hayfields up there. Andy Dufresne: One i...
A menudo se usa la historia como una serie de cuentos morales para aumentar la solidaridad de grupo o, cosa más defendible, según mi punto de vista, para explicar el desarrollo de instituciones importantes como los parlamentos y conceptos como la d...
El estudio de la economía no parece exigir ningún don especializado de un orden excepcionalmente superior. ¿No es una disciplina muy fácil comparada con las ramas superiores de la filosofía o la ciencia pura?. Una disciplina fácil de la que muy...