Quotes from The City and the Pillar

Gore Vidal ·  207 pages

Rating: (5.6K votes)


“We affect one another quite enough merely by existing. Whenever the stars cross, or is it comets? fragments pass briefly from one orbit to another. On rare occasions there is total collision, but most often the two simply continue without incident, neither losing more than a particle to the other, in passing.”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


“Ideally, of course, a relationship is best, but then how many people are capable of deep feeling? Practically none.”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


“Americans tend to play different roles, hoping that somehow they’ll stumble on the right one.”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


“Nothing that ever was changes. Yet nothing that is can ever be the same as what went before.”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


“عاد وحيداً و سعيداً ، مع ثلاثة كؤوسٍ موضوعةٍ أمامه على الطاوله : اثنان فارغان ، وواحد نصف مملوء و عليه آثار أحمر شفاه . رتَّبَ الكؤوس لتُشكِّلَ مثلثاً ، لكنه حين حاولَ ان يرتِّبها على شكلِ مربِّعٍ فشل . لماذا ؟ لأنَّ ثلاثة كؤوس يجب أن تكون قادرةً على تشكيلِ مربَّع . و شعر بالحزن .”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar



“يبدو أن كثيرين من الجنوبيين يكتبون . ربما بسبب الحرب الأهلية . يجب الحصول على مأساة لكي نحصل على أدب .”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


“As the late afternoon sun shone in Shaw's face and a soft flower-scented wind cooled him, his unhappiness turned to a detachment that was not at all unpleasant. He was utterly alone in the world. This knowledge thrilled him.”
― Gore Vidal, quote from The City and the Pillar


About the author

Gore Vidal
Born place: in West Point, New York, The United States
Born date October 3, 1925
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Shamanism resembles an academic discipline (such as anthropology or molecular biology); with its practitioners, fundamental researchers, specialists, and schools of thought it is a way of apprehending the world that evolves constantly. One thing is certain: Both indigenous and mestizo shamans consider people like the Shipibo-Conibo, the Tukano, the Kamsá, and the Huitoto as the equivalents to universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, and the Sorbonne; they are the highest reference in matters of knowledge. In this sense, ayahuasca-based shamanism is an essentially indigenous phenomenon. It belongs to the indigenous people of Western Amizonia, who hold the keys to a way of knowing that they have practiced without interruption for at least five thousand years. In comparison, the universities of the Western world are less than nine hundred years old.”
― Jeremy Narby, quote from The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge


“It's impossible to gather too much information.”
― Juli Zeh, quote from Corpus Delicti. Ein Prozess


“If you pardon the things that unfortunate people do, then what of the people killed by his selfish acts? And the people who say he should be the one killed?" ~ Juri”
― Gong Jiyoung, quote from Watashitachi no Shiawase na Jikan


“No one has the luxury of deciding "when" to travel; you wait prepared to travel whenever the border is open, which could be today, tomorrow or next week or three, four months from now.”
― Izzeldin Abuelaish, quote from I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor's Journey on the Road to Peace and Human Dignity


“Koga briga tko je učinio što kad je poanta svega da smo to učinili zajedno?”
― Andy Mulligan, quote from Trash


Interesting books

Home
(1.7K)
Home
by Stacia Kane
Hell's Corner
(25.4K)
Hell's Corner
by David Baldacci
BZRK
(7.3K)
BZRK
by Michael Grant
Selected Poems
(5.4K)
Selected Poems
by Marina Tsvetaeva
Lois & Clark: A Superman Novel
(119)
Lois & Clark: A Supe...
by C.J. Cherryh
Wasteland
(3.4K)
Wasteland
by Francesca Lia Block

About BookQuoters

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.