“You speak English beautifully, which means you can't be English.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
“It is amazing how full a life a man can lead without for one moment being alive at all, except sometimes when sleeping.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
“Enchanted islands are hard to understand,' he said. 'I've always thought that. It worried me even as a child. The trouble is that you can never be sure where the enchantment begins and where it ends.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
“Dreams, [...], are misleading, because they make life seem real. When it loses the support of dreams, life dissolves.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
“No milk. It is black coffee, pure but strong, that fortifies against the powers of darkness with which the world is filled.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
“Things mechanical are like the ladies,’ continued Toby. ‘You need to understand their ways. If you understand them, they’ll do what you want from the start. If you don’t, they’ve got you. And then God help you.”
― Robert Aickman, quote from The Wine-Dark Sea
Robert Aickman
Born place: in London, The United Kingdom
Born date June 27, 1914
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“The giant, once well buried, now stirs. When soon he rises,”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, quote from The Buried Giant
“I have now scoured your Internet, and have identified several ersatz concierges that were created by your own society, and are in current and active use throughout it. I strongly suggest that you allow me to import and implement one of them.” I caught Manda’s eye. She shrugged. “Sure,” I said. “Earth’s most popular ersatz concierge has had hundreds of millions of users—although its usage has declined rather dramatically in recent years. Shall we try that one?” I really, really, really should have asked why the thing was shedding users. Instead I shrugged and said, “Why not?” The dazzling, octodimensional projection instantly transformed into a flat rendering of a paperclip with googly eyes. “That’s an ersatz concierge?” Manda whispered after a shocked silence. “Dear God …” As she said this, the paperclip’s eyes darted cunningly from side to side. Then a cartoon bubble appeared above its head reading, “It looks like you’re writing a letter. Would you like help?” It was Clippy—the despised emcee of Microsoft Office. I knew him well. Because while he had allegedly retired long ago, my firm—like so many others—had clung to the Clippy-infested Windows XP operating system for years beyond its expiration date, staving off the expense and trauma of a Windows upgrade. That process had finally started eighteen months back. But copyright associates are low in the priority queue—and I had been slated to get upgraded “next month” for as long as I could remember. “Okay, go back,” I said. Clippy stared at me impassively. “Stop it. Cut it out. Go back. Use the other interface. Use the gem thing.” As I said this, Clippy’s eyes started darting again as he scribbled on a notepad with an animated pencil. Another cartoon bubble appeared. “It looks like you’re making a list. Should I format it?” I fell into an appalled silence. Then Manda gave it a shot. “We do not want to use this ersatz concierge,” she enunciated clearly. “Please return us to the previous one.” Clippy gazed back with bovine incomprehension. We went on to try every command, plea, and threat that we could think of. But we couldn’t get back to the prior concierge. Luckily, the stereopticon’s projector mode was still working fine (“If you download Windows Media Player, I’m throwing you under a bus,” Manda warned it).”
― Rob Reid, quote from Year Zero
“She repeated the thought again for good measure—and because she liked to hear herself think.”
― Jennifer Shirk, quote from Fiance by Fate
“God, he’s sexy. No wonder he was a little shit all the time.”
― Laura Thalassa, quote from The Vanishing Girl
“Despite what they say, the clothes do not make the man. They merely determine the set of assumptions others make about the man.”
― quote from What Would Satan Do?
Low Red Moon
The Smoke Thief
Collected Short Stor...
Casanova in Bolzano
BreathlessBookQuoters 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.
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