We mustn't be stiff and stand-off, you know. We must be thoroughly democratic, and patronize everybody without distinction of clas...s.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is true, we are such poor navigators that our thoughts, for the most part, stand off and on upon a harborless coast, are conver...sant only with the bights of the bays of poesy, or steer for the public ports of entry, and go into the dry docks of science, where they merely refit for this world, and no natural currents concur to individualize them.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
If thou be invited of a mighty man, withdraw thyself, and so much the more will he invite thee. Press thou not upon him, lest thou... be put back; stand not far off, lest thou be forgotten.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The world is eaten up by boredom.... You can't see it all at once. It is like dust. You go about and never notice, you breathe it ...in, you eat and drink it. It is sifted so fine, it doesn't even grit on your teeth. But stand still for an instant and there it is, coating your face and hands. To shake off this drizzle of ashes you must be for ever on the go. And so people are always "on the go."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Run fast, stand still. This, the lesson from lizards. For all writers. Observe almost any survival creature, you see the same. Jum...p, run, freeze. In the ability to flick like an eyelash, crack like a whip, vanish like steam, here this instant, gone the next--life teems the earth. And when that life is not rushing to escape, it is playing statues to do the same. See the hummingbird, there, not there. As thought arises and blinks off, so this thing of summer vapor; the clearing of a cosmic throat, the fall of a leaf. And where it was--a whisper. What can we writers learn from lizards, lift from birds? In quickness is truth. The faster you blurt, the more swiftly you write, the more honest you are. In hesitation is thought. In delay comes the effort for a style, instead of leaping upon truth which is the only style worth deadfalling or tiger-trapping. In between the scurries and flights, what? Be a chameleon, ink- blend, chromosome change with the landscape. Be a pet rock, lie with the dust, rest in the rainwater in the filled barrel by the drainspout outside your grandparents' window long ago.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
... the Hatter [said], tossing his head contemptuously. "I dare say you never even spoke to Time!" "Perhaps not," Alice cauti...ously replied; "but I know I have to beat time when I learn music." "Ah! That accounts for it," said the Hatter. "He wo'n't stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked with the clock. for instance, suppose it were nine o'clock in the morning, just in time to begin lessons: you'd only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half past one, time for dinner!" I rarely disobeyed Daddy, both because of my respect for him and because I knew that punishment for my transgressions would be certain and sometimes severe.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Feminist art is not some tiny creek running off the great river of real art. It is not some crack in an otherwise flawless stone. ...It is, quite spectacularly I think, art which is not based on the subjugation of one half of the species. It is art which will take the great human themes--love, death, heroism, suffering, history itself--and render them fully human. It may also, though perhaps our imaginations are so mutilated now that we are incapable even of the ambition, introduce a new theme, one as great and as rich as those others--should we call it "joy"?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Fear, when your friends say to you what you have done well, and say it through; but when they stand with uncertain timid looks of ...respect and half-dislike, and must suspend their judgement for years to come, you may begin to hope.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The Cossack eats Poland, Like stolen fruit;... Her last noble is ruined, Her last poet mute: Straight, into double band The victors divide; Half for freedom strike and stand;-- The astonished Muse finds thousands at her side.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »