“Lists are a form of power.”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“...it is not possible to create the opposite of what one has always known, simply because the opposite is believed to be desired. Human beings need what they already know, even horrors.”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“There was a moment during this time, when his face was on hers, cheek on cheek, brow on brow, heavy skull on skull, through soft skin and softer flesh. He thought: skulls separate people. In this one sense, I could say, they would say, I lose myself in her. But in that bone box, she thinks and thinks, as I think in mine, things the other won't hear, can't hear, though we go on like this for sixty years. What does she think I am? He had no idea. He had no idea what she was.”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“A metamorphosis... The shining butterfly of the soul from the pupa of the body. Larva, pupa, imago. An image of art.”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“Those words . . . national and portrait. They were both to do with identity: the identity of a culture (place, language and history), the identity of an individual human being as an object for mimetic representation.”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“Contemporary' was in those days [1953] synonymous with 'modern' as it had not been before and is not now [1977].”
― A.S. Byatt, quote from The Virgin in the Garden
“We stood for roll call in that early-morning light, our noses twitching in an effort to shake the stench of ash and the unwashed. September's heat lingered in the air. It bounced off us in waves, haloed us with dust. This roll call was the first time I saw all of Mengele's subjects gathered together: the multiples, the giants, the Lilliputs, the limbless, the Jews he's deemed curiously Aryan in appearance.”
― Affinity Konar, quote from Mischling
“Otro hombre toca lo que es mío y lo mato. Lo destrozaría, Ria. Cualquiera que se atreva a intentar hacerte daño, y la locura será la menor de mis debilidades. Me destruirá. Eres mía-Mercury”
― Lora Leigh, quote from Mercury's War
“The moon was through to the sunset side of the gap, but its light was hardly noticeable on the earth for the ruddy brilliance of the firelight.”
― William Golding, quote from The Inheritors
“For a detective or street police, the only real satisfaction is the work itself; when a cop spends more and more time getting aggravated with the details, he's finished. The attitude of co-workers, the indifference of superiors, the poor quality of the equipment - all of it pales if you still love the job; all of it matters if you don't.”
― David Simon, quote from Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets
“Paul Samuelson, first American to win the Nobel Prize in Economic Science: "The most efficient way to diversify a stock portfolio is with a low fee index fund. Statistically, a broadly based stock index fund will outperform most actively managed equity portfolios.”
― quote from The Bogleheads' Guide to Investing
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.