Peter Matthiessen · 384 pages
Rating: (2.4K votes)
“You mean...” Billy exclaimed at last, “you mean...” – his voice rose high and clear – “you mean...” – and he jumped to his feet, and standing there under the giant trees, pointed at himself, a small outraged boy named William Martin Quarrier, aged eight: “You mean I just came crashing down into Ma’s under-pants?”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
“In the jungle, during one night in each month, the moths did not come to the lanterns; through the black reaches of the outer night, so it was said, they flew toward the full moon.”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
“Holding his breath, swaying drunkenly beneath a bulb which illumined little more than grime and moisture, Moon stared awhile at the cement wall; it took just such a hopeless international latrine in the early hours of a morning, when a man was weak in the knees, short in the breath, numb in the forehead and rotten in the gut, to make him wonder where he was, how he got there, where he was going; he realized that he did not know and never would. He had confronted this same latrine on every continent and not once had it come up with an answer; or rather, it always came up with the same answer, a suck and gurgle of unspeakable vileness, a sort of self-satisfied low chuckling: Go to it, man, you’re pissing your life away.”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
“It was a gringo; in the remote corners of the world the short-sleeved flowered tourist shirt, the steel-rimmed glasses, khaki pants and bulldog shoes had become the uniform of earnest American enterprise. Moon recognized the man as the new missionary. His head was cropped too close, so that his white skull gleamed, and the red skin of his neck and jaw was riddled with old acne; his face was bald with anxiety and tiresome small agonies.”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
“I’m surprised you holy people talk to me,” Wolfie said suddenly, “after what I done.” He swayed there a moment, frowning. “As a Catholic priest, I must accept men’s frailty. And as a European I am too old and tired to expend emotion upon matters I can do nothing about.”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
“Well, he was scarcely a parfit gentil knight; as Wolfie said, he looked like some Hollywood Geronimo trying to kick a ninety-dollar habit.”
― Peter Matthiessen, quote from At Play in the Fields of the Lord
Peter Matthiessen
Born place: in New York City, The United States
Born date May 22, 1927
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“People always say they can't do things, that they're impossible. They just haven't been creative enough. This pool is a triumph of imagination. That's how you win at life, Gin. You have to imagine your way through. Never say something can't be done. There's always a solution, even if it's weird.”
― Maureen Johnson, quote from The Last Little Blue Envelope
“The vocational approach at NOCCA (New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts) helps build grit in students. It teaches them how to be single-minded in pursuit of a goal, to sacrifice for the sake of a passion. The teachers demand hard work from their kids because they know, from personal experience, that creative success requires nothing less.”
― Jonah Lehrer, quote from Imagine: How Creativity Works
“Life is a performance, I thought. Perthaps the word "illusion" would have meant more or less the same thing, but to me "performance" seemed closed to the truth. Standing there in the midst of the crowd that evening, I felt this realization swirl dizzily through my body in a dazzling splendor of light, if only for an instant. Each one of us continues to carry the heart of each self we've ever been, at every stage along the way, and a chaos of everything good and rotten. And we have to carry this weight all alone, through each day that we live. We try to be as nice as we can to the people we love, but we alone support the weight of ourselves.”
― Banana Yoshimoto, quote from Goodbye Tsugumi
“I narrowed my eyes. I don't trust you.
I don't trust you,either.
So we don't move.
Ever? He met my eyes again,and searched me.”
― Jodi Meadows, quote from The Orphan Queen
“My mom told me once that she wouldn't be a kid again for a million bucks. She said things hurt more when you don't have any perspective on pain.
That's true.
But doesn't everyone want to be young and hot forever?
They only think they want it, Parker. But nobody really wants anything forever. Just for longer than they get it.”
― Tommy Wallach, quote from Thanks for the Trouble
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