“Where are you from, Mr. Pendergast? Can't quite place the accent.”
“New Orleans.”
“What a coincidence! I went there for Mardi Gras once."
“How nice for you. I myself have never attended.”
Ludwig paused, the smile frozen on his face, wondering how to steer the conversation onto a more pertinent topic.”
― Douglas Preston, quote from Still Life With Crows
“I have found that liars in the end communicate more truth than do truth tellers.” “How’s that?” “Because truth is the safest lie.”
― Douglas Preston, quote from Still Life With Crows
“quotation from Einstein: ‘The only thing more dangerous than ignorance is arrogance.’ I would suggest to Dr. Chauncy that in combination, the two qualities are even more alarming.”
― Douglas Preston, quote from Still Life With Crows
“Chauncy made a huge effort to control himself. “I had lunch at Maisie’s Diner.”
“And?”
“And what? It was the most revolting lunch it has been my misfortune to consume.”
“And after?”
“Diarrhea, of course.”
― Douglas Preston, quote from Still Life With Crows
“She picked up the book she was reading, Beyond the Ice Limit, found her dog-eared place at the beginning of chapter six, and began to read. The sea horizon lay against the sky, blue against perfect blue, and it seemed to beckon the ship southward, ever southward. She closed the book, put it down again. Not bad, but it lacked the punch of the original.”
― Douglas Preston, quote from Still Life With Crows
“Dance of the Sugar Plum Bikey. Yes, that's got a nice ring to it.”
― Louise Rennison, quote from Withering Tights
“Her mother, an unshapely, chubby-cheeked creature from the rural gentry of Styria, permanently lost her hair at the age of forty after being treated for influenza by her husband, and prematurely withdrew from society. She and her husband were able to live in the Gentzgasse thanks to her mother's fortune, which derived from the family estates in Styria and then devolved upon her. She provided for everything, since her husband earned nothing as a doctor. He was a socialite, what is known as a beau, who went to all the big Viennese balls during the carnival season and throughout his life was able to conceal his stupidity behind a pleasingly slim exterior. Throughout her life Auersberger's mother-in-law had a raw deal from her husband, but was content to accept her modest social station, not that of a member of the nobility, but one that was thoroughly petit bourgeois. Her son-in-law, as I suddenly recalled, sitting in the wing chair, made a point of hiding her wig from time to time--whenever the mood took him--both in the Gentzgasse and at the Maria Zaal in Styria, so that the poor woman was unable to leave the house. It used to amuse him, after he had hidden her wig, to drive his mother-in-law up the wall, as they say. Even when he was going on forty he used to hide her wigs--by that time she has provided herself with several--which was a symptom of his sickness and infantility. I often witnessed this game of hide-and-seek at Maria Zaal and in the Gentzgasse, and I honestly have to say that I was amused by it and did not feel in the least bit ashamed of myself. His mother-in-law would be forced to stay at home because her son-in-law had hidden her wigs, and this was especially likely to happen on public holidays. In the end he would throw the wig in her face. He needed his mother-in-law's humiliation, I reflected, sitting in the wing chair and observing him in the background of the music room, just as he needed the triumph that this diabolical behavior brought him.”
― Thomas Bernhard, quote from Woodcutters
“MAYBE IT WOULD be a good idea to rearrange the flat a bit,’ said Mum. ‘I’ve been thinking. You and Kendall might like your own den, more of a play space. So how about us turning the bedroom into your room. It’s purple too, your favourite colour.’ ‘Lilac isn’t purple.’ ‘It’s light purple, Miss Picky. Anyway, I was thinking of getting a little portable telly for you two. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Then the living room could be more – well, my room.’ ‘And you want to put a socking great bed in it for you and Jake,’ I said coldly. ‘No I don’t! Well. I was thinking about one of them sofa beds. Then if Jake should want to stay over . . .’ ‘Why can’t he stay in his own place?’ ‘He hasn’t exactly got his own place,’ said Mum. ‘He’s staying with a friend at the moment.’ ‘Why can’t he get his own place, then?’ I said. ‘Because he hasn’t got any money. He’s a student.’ ‘They give them rooms in the university, don’t they?’ ‘Only the first year. For God’s sake, Lola Rose, give it a rest. He’s coming to live with us and that’s that. I don’t see why you’ve got such a problem with it. We’re in love, can’t you see?’ ‘He doesn’t love you. He’s just shacking up with us because he hasn’t got anywhere else. And you spend a fortune on him. Our fortune.’ Mum slapped me straight across the face. Kendall was watching. He cried. I didn’t cry. I stared Mum out. ‘You only slapped me because you know it’s true.’ ‘I slapped you because you’re a spoilt little cow,’ Mum snapped. ‘What’s the matter with you, Lola Rose? You can’t be jealous, can you?”
― Jacqueline Wilson, quote from Lola Rose
“She was like having our own nanny, the Sex Nanny Sent By Satan.”
― Mark Peter Hughes, quote from Lemonade Mouth
“أيها البشر الزائلون التعساء، يا أبناء المخاطر والشدائد! لماذا تجبرونني على قول ما قد يكون الأفضل لكم ألا تسمعوه؟ إن أفضل الأشياء هو الشيء الذي يوجد خارج قبضتكم كليةً: ألا تولدوا، ألا تكونوا، أن تكونوا لا شيء. ولكن ثاني أفضل الأشياء لكم هو أن تندثروا في أقرب وقت.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, quote from The Birth of Tragedy
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.
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