“music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but
you are the music
While the music lasts.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“You do not know how much they mean to me, my friends,
And how, how rare and strange it is, to find
In a life composed so much, so much of odds and ends,
(For indeed I do not love it ... you knew? you are not blind! How keen you are!)
To find a friend who has these qualities,
Who has, and gives
Those qualities upon which friendship lives.
How much it means that I say this to you-
Without these friendships-life, what cauchemar!”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Now that the lilacs are in bloom
She has a bowl of lilacs in her room”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Yet with these April sunsets, that somehow recall
My buried life, and Paris in the spring,
I feel immeasurably at peace, and find the world
To be wonderful and youthful afterall”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“And what you thought you came for
is only a shell, a husk of meaning
from which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilled
if at all. Either you had no purpose
or the purpose is beyond the end you figured
And is altered in fulfillment.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Honest criticism and sensible appreciation are directed not upon the poet but upon the poetry.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;
Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word...
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“I decided that if the shaking of her breasts could be stopped, some of the fragments of the afternoon might be collected, and I concentrated my attention with careful subtlety to this end.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“And in short, I was afraid.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Daffodil bulbs instead of balls
Stared from the sockets of the eyes!
He knew that thought clings round dead limbs
Tightening its lusts and luxuries.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“I could see nothing behind that child’s eye. 40
I have seen eyes in the street
Trying to peer through lighted shutters,
And a crab one afternoon in a pool,
An old crab with barnacles on his back,
Gripped the end of a stick which I held him.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Under the penitential gates
Sustained by staring Seraphim
Where the souls of the devout
Burn invisible and dim.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Words strain, Crack and sometimes break, under the burden, Under the tension, slip, slide, perish, Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place, Will not stay still.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
“Time and the bell have buried the day,
The black cloud carries the sun away.
Will the sunflower turn to us, will the clematis
Stray down, bend to us; tendril and spray
Clutch and cling?
Chill
Fingers of yew be curled
Down on us? After the kingfisher's wing
Has answered light to light, and is silent, the light is still
At the still point of the turning world.”
― T.S. Eliot, quote from Collected Poems, 1909-1962
T.S. Eliot
Born place: in St. Louis, Missouri, The United States
Born date September 26, 1888
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“she was remembering what it was like when you broke up with someone. Conversations became so hopelessly tangled. You had to be polite and precise. You couldn’t safely criticize anymore, because you didn’t have the right. You’d lost your immunity.”
― Liane Moriarty, quote from What Alice Forgot
“Memory could be a terrible thing .. an instrument of torture that persists in its work long after a man has suffered his time upon the rack.”
― Leila Meacham, quote from Roses
“All our final decisions are made in a state of mind that is not going to last.”
― Marcel Proust, quote from In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower
“I want a proper school, sir, to teach reading and writing, and most of all thinking, sir, so people can find out what they are good at, because someone doing what they really like is always an asset to any country, and too often people never find out until it is too late. There have been times, lately, when I dearly wished that I could change the past. Well, I can't, but I can change the present, so that when it becomes the past it will turn out to be a past worth having....Learning is about finding out who you are, what you are, where you are and what you are standing on and what you are good at and what's over the horizon and, well, everything. Its about finding the place where you fit. I found the place where I fit, and I would like everybody else to find theirs." - Tiffany Aching”
― Terry Pratchett, quote from I Shall Wear Midnight
“However, neither he nor anyone else could have become the star Elvis was. Ain't nobody like Elvis. Never was.”
― Johnny Cash, quote from Cash
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Been Down So Long it...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
