Quotes on literature

“Literature is a textually transmitted disease, normally contracted in childhood.”

Jane Yolen

“Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity.”

G.K. Chesterton

“No man is offended by another man's admiration of the woman he loves; it is the woman only who can make it a torment.”

Jane Austen

“Keep your friends close but your enemies closer.”

Mario Puzo

“It is rare for people to be asked the question which puts them squarely in front of themselves”

Arthur Miller

“In life there are two things which are dependable. The pleasures of the flesh and the pleasures of literature.”

Sei Shōnagon

“Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one.”

Terry Pratchett

“Write what you know. That should leave you with a lot of free time.”

Howard Nemerov

“Puns are the highest form of literature.”

Alfred Hitchcock

“Oh! it is absurd to have a hard-and-fast rule about what one should read and what one shouldn't. More than half of modern culture depends on what one shouldn't read.”

Oscar Wilde

“Mother used to say that however miserable one is, there’s always something to be thankful for. And each morning, when the sky brightened and light began to flood my cell, I agreed with her.”

Albert Camus

“Comedy aims at representing men as worse, Tragedy as better than in actual life.”

Aristotle

“A breeze, a forgotten summer, a smile, all can fit into a storefront window.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“An honest bookstore would post the following sign above its 'self-help' section: 'For true self-help, please visit our philosophy, literature, history and science sections, find yourself a good book, read it, and think about it.”

Roger Ebert

“They blossomed, they did not talk about blossoming.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Knighthood lies above eternity; it doesn’t live off fame, but rather deeds.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“It's always seemed a little preposterous that Hamlet, for all his paralyzing doubt about everything, never once doubts the reality of the ghost. Never questions his own madness might not in fact be unfeigned.”

David Foster Wallace

“Arrival in the world is really a departure and that, which we call departure, is only a return.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“From whichever side I start, I think I am in an old place where others have been before me.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Teaching others, he corrected himself.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“The same word we love and hate, leaves in different directions, taking different paths.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Different languages, the same thoughts; servant to thoughts and their masters.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Kein Philosoph würde ein dickes Buch schreiben, wenn er im Vornherein wüsste, auf welche Weise er später zitiert werden wird.”

Juli Zeh

“You never know who you're inspiring or uninspiring. People notice more than you think.”

Amaka Imani Nkosazana

“It is beautiful to express love and even more beautiful to feel it.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“You are not what you are; You are darkness Looking for light within.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“The most complicated skill is to be simple.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Since there is no real silence, Silence will contain all the sounds, All the words, all the languages, All knowledge, all memory.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“[novan]: bassists are very good with their fingers[novan]: and some of us sing backup vocals, so that means we're good with our mouths too...(~ IM chat with Novan Chang, 18, bassist)”

Jess C Scott

“Even great men bow before the Sun; it melts hubris into humility.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“In trying to be perfect, He perfected the art of anonymity, Became imperceptible And arrived nowhere from nowhere.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Trying too hard to be too good, even when trying to be bad, is too good for the bad, too bad for the good.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Total knowledge is annihilation Of the desire to see, to touch, to feel The world sensed only through senses And immune to the knowledge without feeling.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Heavenly bodies are nests of invisible birds.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“A smiling lie is a whirlwind, easy to enter, but hard to escape.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Sound unbound by nature becomes bounded by art.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Vandals listen only when others are stronger.If vandals are equal or strongerTheir word is the last word.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“I visited many places, Some of them quite Exotic and far away, But I always returned to myself.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“To hide feelings when you are near crying is the secret of dignity.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Green in nature is one thing, green in literature another. Nature and letters seem to have a natural antipathy; bring them together and they tear each other to pieces.”

Virginia Woolf

“There is another alphabet, whispering from every leaf, singing from every river, shimmering from every sky.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“One hand I extend into myself, the other toward others.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Words rich in meaning can be cheap in sound effects.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“For a game, you don’t need a teacher.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“You not only are hunted by others, you unknowingly hunt yourself.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“Poetry isn’t an island, it is the bridge. Poetry isn’t a ship, it is the lifeboat. Poetry isn’t swimming. Poetry is water.”

Kamand Kojouri

“We don’t know anything about silent sages, buried knowledge, the eye of the mute poet, serene seers, yet how many talkative destroyers, prophets and ideologues, teachers and beautifiers there are on the other side.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“To jump over centuries In one step is impossible. Jump too high or far, You’ll be way too late.”

Dejan Stojanovic

“I only wrote prose before I met you. My musings were superfluous and serious as well. But now the words dance with me. I sing with them and we create poetry.”

Kamand Kojouri