Unlike television, reading does not swallow the senses or dictate thought. Reading stimulates the ecology of the imagination. Can you remember the wonder you felt when first reading The Jungle Book or Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn? Kipling’s world...
Albert Camus wrote that the only serious question is whether to kill yourself or not. Tom Robbins wrote that the only serious question is whether time has a beginning and an end. Camus clearly got up on the wrong side of bed, and Robbins must have fo...
I have a lot of faith. But I am also afraid a lot, and have no real certainty about anything. I remembered something Father Tom had told me--that the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includ...
If words had cost money, Tom couldn't have used them more sparingly. The adjectives were purely descriptive, relating to form and colour, and were used to present the objects under consideration, not the young explorer's emotions. Yet through this au...
The faces of your young people in general are not interesting—I don't mean the children, but the young men and women—and they are awkward and clownish in their manners, without the quaintness of the elder generation, who are the funniest old dear...
We both disliked rude rickshwalas, shepu bhaji in any form, group photographs at weddings, lizards, tea that has gone cold, the habit of taking newspaper to the toilet, kissing a boy who'd just smoked a cigarette et cetra. Another list. The things we...
In a dark layer of Esme's memory there was a kiss. Vividly she recalled Mihai in the snow, naked and fanged. That kiss had conjured ancient passions a god had tried to erase, and Esme remembered the pressure of it and even knew the flavor of that bla...
I had that laser focus, identified what I wanted when I was a kid, and never let anything get in my way. If you look on paper at who I am and what I sound like, and what I look like, you wouldn't say, 'Go into broadcasting.' It's just what I wanted t...
For a moment she knew exactly what he was thinking, not just about Tom, but about her, and himself, and all of life, and she liked the way he saw things. She could spend her life tuning into the calming frequency of his thoughts. He wasn't a stiff, a...
Um dia, em conversa com alguns colegas da orquestra que em tom ligeiro falavam sobre a possibilidade da composição de retratos musicais, retratos autênticos, (...) lembrou-se de dizer que o seu retrato, no caso de existir de facto em música, não...
Narrator: [as Grace attempts to make her case] If forgiveness was close at hand in the mission house, they were all hiding it well. It hadn't been easy for Tom to get them there. Appealing to consciences stowed farther and farther away by their owner...
Melanie Hamilton: So, you've got my husband intoxicated again, Captain Butler. Well, bring him in! Tom - Yankee Captain: I'm sorry, Mrs. Wilkes. Your husband's under arrest. Melanie Hamilton: If you arrest all the men who get intoxicated in Atlanta, ...
Harry Potter: You were right. When you told Professor Snape that wand was failing you. It will always fail you! Lord Voldemort: I killed Snape! Harry Potter: But what if that wand never belonged to Snape? What if its allegiance was always to someone ...
[about the newspaper clipping Ron was showing Harry and Hermione] George Weasley: Not flashing that clipping again, are you, Ron? Ron: I haven't shown anyone! Fred Weasley: No, not a soul! Unless you count Tom. George Weasley: The day maid. Fred Weas...
Dutton Peabody: [during voting for the territorial convention] I'll have the usual, Jack. Jack, Barman: The bar is closed, Mister Editor, during voting. Dutton Peabody: Bar's closed? Tom Doniphon: You can blame your lawyer friend. He says that's one ...
Tom Baxter: I was thinking about some very deep things. About God and his relation with Irving Saks and R.H. Levine. And I was thinking about life in general. The origin of everything we see about us. The finality of death; how almost magical it seem...
Captain Frye: You changed the coordinates, didn't you, General? General Hummel: That's affirmative, Captain. Sergeant Crisp: So now they think we're gutless, the feds? They think we won't actually do it? Captain Frye: They're going to come at us with...
Skinner: I want you to work up something for my latest frozen food concept: Gusteau's Corn Puppies. They're like corn dogs, only smaller. Bite size. Francois: What are corn dogs? Skinner: Cheap sausages dipped in batter and deep fried. You know, Amer...
Rooster Cogburn: Why, by God, girl, that's a Colt's Dragoon! You're no bigger than a corn nubbin, what're you doing with all this pistol? Mattie Ross: It belonged to my father, he carried it bravely in the war, and I intend to kill Tom Chaney with it...
Status is a funny thing. Money gets you stuff, at least. Status doesn't get you much except the knowledge that you have it. And while money may not make you happy, it is easy to imagine someone who decides they have enough. With status, you can never...
True, [Gary Nolan] might not strike fear into the hearts of all you free-swinging power hitters out there—at least not in the same way as, say, Tom Seaver … but without question he was one of the most talented pitchers in baseball during the Big ...
