Though it’s true that (dictionary-maker Samuel) Johnson sometimes seem to feel that the language was in decline, he didn’t rail against it with (Jonathan) Swift’s anger. Instead, he hoped the example of his dictionary would...

Very broadly, literature concerns itself with the internal, cinema with the external.

I watched the shadow of our plane hastening below us across hedges and fences, rows of poplars and canals … Nowhere, however, was a single human being to be seen. No matter whether one is...

There are a large number of people in the room, but one is unaware of them. They are in the books. At times they move among the pages, like sleepers turning over between two dreams....

Sentimentality was used because other political avenues were closed, and authors hoped that through it they could bring about a political change that would fulfill the egalitarian promises of the Revolution. Real political venues were...

Sometimes, in the course of my hopeless quest, I would pick up and dip into one of the ordinary books that lay strewn around the castle. Whenever I did, it seemed so insipid and insubstantial...

In the end, you have to choose whether or not to trust someone.

My definition of an intellectual is someone who can listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger” – Billy Connolly

Literature is like a subtle concoction of laboriously collected peripherals called words, intellect,thoughts,imagination,creativity and aestheticism brewed together to form a resplendent work of art.

She had thought of literature all these years (her seclusion, her rank, her sex must be her excuse) as something wild as the wind, hot as fire, swift as lightning; something errant, incalculable, abrupt, and...

If literature has engaged me as a project, first as a reader, then as a writer, it is as an extension of my sympathies to other selves, other domains, other dreams, other territories.

This irritated or puzzled such students of literature and their professors as were accustomed to ‘serious’ courses replete with ‘trends ’ and ‘schools ’ and ‘myths ’ and ‘symbols ’ and ‘social comment ’ and...

I thought a lighthouse is out at sea.

Rainer Maria Rilke greeted and wrestled with the angels of his Duino Elegies in the solitude of a castle surrounded by white cliffs tall trees and the sea. I greeted most of mine in the...

If you are writing a story, miracles or abnormal events may be bad art, or they may not. If, for example, you are writing an ordinary realistic novel and have got your characters into a...

Written words, if carefully laid down, represent the civilized ideal of reason.

Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress. When I get fed up with one, I spend the night with the other

We create words, words create wonders.

Ölümden önce meşalesi yanan bir kimsenin ışığı sonsuzluğa kadar devam eder.

But literature is unique. To understand literature, you read it with your head, but you interpret it with your heart. The two are forced to work together-and, quite frankly, they often don’t get along.

Without literature, life is hell.

Editör Hanım, ‘Otuz beş yaşında mühendisliği bıraktı ve kendini edebiyata verdi.’ cümlesinin biyografimde güzel duracağını düşündüğüm için işimden istifa ettim. Küçük burjuvaların kayda değer lükslerden biri de kendi biyografilerini hayal edebilmeleri ve bazı şeyleri sırf...

Families start out, most of the time, with unconditional acceptance of one another. That acceptance starts in childhood and continues into adulthood. Somewhere in there, between childhood and adulthood, the ability to distinguish right versus...

Words rich in meaning can be cheap in sound effects.

Omnipotence and omniscience are the end of power and knowledge.

Don Quixote is not an imaginary person; he is as real as Alexander the Great.

Instead of imitating me, you simply loiter.

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

If you are only what you are, You at least have a chance Not to outsmart, But be on a par with yourself And that is worth trying.

Without pleasure there is no sight or measure.

There are no winners in real games.

Get close to grass and you’ll see a star.

Shirley Jackson’s writings are a must for aficionados of the gothic and of good literature.

this is the weakness of most ‘edifying’ or ‘propaganda’ literature. There is no diversity…You cannot, in fact, give God His due without giving the devil his due also.

Jane, be still; don’t struggle so like a wild, frantic bird, that is rending its own plumage in its desperation.””I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being, with...

In the grand tradition, both Chinese and Western painting have a close link with literature,

The world of literature is a sacred mirror that shows not the reality around us but the dreams and fears that reality stimulates: It’s not where we live, but life itself.

I don’t want to be a vampire’ she told herself. But in her dreams, she kind of did.-Tana Bach-page 29-chapter 4

I drove all night, northeast, and once again I felt it was literature I had been confronting these past days, the archetypes of the dismal mystery, sons and daughters of the archetypes, images that could...

Doğum yapalı bir saat bile olmamıştı. Tom’un nerede olduğunu Tanrı bilir. Narkozdan çıkınca yoğun bir terkedilmişlik hissi içimi kapladı ve hastabakıcıya kız mı oğlan mı diye sordum. Kız olduğunu öğrenince de, arkamı döndüm ve ağladım...

No fiction is worth reading except for entertainment. If it entertains and is clean, it is good literature, or its kind. If it forms the habit of reading, in people who might not read otherwise,...

A people’s literature is the great textbook for real knowledge of them. The writings of the day show the quality of the people as no historical reconstruction can.

Gerçek su yüzüne çıkıyor ve hiçbir şey onu durduramayacak. Olay ancak bugün başlıyor, çünkü konumlar ancak bugün açık olarak ortaya çıktı: bir yanda, ışığın parlamasını istemeyen suçlular; öbür yanda ışığın parlaması için canlarını verecek doğrucular....

We human beings build houses because we’re alive but we write books because we’re mortal. We live in groups because we’re sociable but we read because we know we’re alone. Reading offers a kind of...

Apart from such chaotic classics as these, my own taste in novel reading is one which I am prepared in a rather especial manner, not only to declare, but to defend. My taste is for...

Nobody could catch cold by the sea; nobody wanted appetite by the sea; nobody wanted spirits; nobody wanted strength. Sea air was healing, softening, relaxing — fortifying and bracing — seemingly just as was wanted...

When my words are concealedWith lies and disguises, truth and beyondInsecurities in the veil of trustBetrayal in bounds of liesIt’s just the charm of words darlingGiving the illusion of happiness inside misery

The morality of art consists, for everyone, in the side that flatters its own interests. People do not like literature.

If you can put your five fingers throught it, it is a gate, if not a door.

I will find you another long-forgotten Queen Mab poem in no time. Depend on it. I refuse to let Cody or anyone else know more about English Literature than me. So calm yourself, Elfish, and...