Category Detail for Literature (69 Quotes)

  Author Category Subject Content
1 Abraham Lincoln Literature Writing Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world...enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.
2 Albert Einstein Literature Reading Reading after a certain age diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking.
3 Ambrose Bierce Humor Books The covers of this book are too far apart.
4 Anne Bronte Literature Courage But he that dare not grasp the thorn Should never crave the rose.
5 Elie Wiesel Literature Writing There is a difference between a book of two hundred pages from the very beginning, and a book of two hundred pages which is the result of an original eight hundred pages. The six hundred are there. Only you don't see them.
6 Flannery O'Connor Literature Writing Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them.
7 Frank Lloyd Wright Literature Writing I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters.
8 Goethe Literature Action Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
9 Harriet Martineau Literature Philosophy Readers are plentiful, thinkers are rare.
10 Helen Keller Literature Thought I am heir of all the ages - heir of their wealth of thought and high endeavor.
11 Henry David Thoreau Literature Books Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them at all.
12 Henry David Thoreau Literature Aspiration Happy are those who dream dreams, and are willing to pay the price to make them reality.
13 Henry David Thoreau Literature Focus There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.
14 Henry David Thoreau Literature Philosophy To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts; but so to love wisdom as to live by its dictates.
15 Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Literature Persistence The heights by great men reached and kept, Were not attained by sudden flight, But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upward in the night.
16 J.K. Rowling Entertainment Villains I have met enough people I don't like in my life to have a fairly shrewd idea of what I want my baddies to be like.
17 James Bryce Literature Books The worth of a book is what you can carry away from it.
18 Larry Arnn Literature Books The great books beckon us to a road upward.
19 Lewis Carroll Literature Goals Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here? That depends a good deal on where you want to get to, said the Cat. I don't much care where - said Alice. Then it doesn't matter which way you go, said the Cat. -so long as I get somewhere, Alice added as an explanation. Oh, you're sure to do that, said the Cat, if you only walk long enough.
20 M. Night Shyamalan Literature Writing Shyamalan wrote some dialogue for a birthday party - a turning point, though it never made it to the screen - where the sensitive kid and a chubby kid are just sitting there, friendless and ostracized. The sensitive kid tells the chubby kid, "My mom said God made some of us different, knowing that it'd be hard. But he picked the people who would be different really carefully." Then the sensitive kid leans forward to the chubby kid: "God thinks we’re strong."... "I was only 10," says Haley Joel Osment, "but I could tell it was amazing writing."...I ask why Manoj ever stopped calling himself Manoj. "You are pronouncing it so well," his mother says, sweetly. (It’s Ma-noge.) She says that Shyamalan's teachers used to mangle it, so when he was a teenager he came up with Night. His father tells me that his son always felt a kinship with the Native Americans, and that the word resonated for them because the elders told their children stories around the fire in the evening and because you can see the universe only at night.
21 Marilyn Green Faulkner Literature Timeless Do you ever wonder what makes a great book great? To begin with, great books offer a higher level of language, characterization, and insight than average books, along with a quality of timelessness that makes them relevant to readers in any age...A great book is designed to change your mind, touch your heart, and lift your spirit. You should emerge from the experience of reading with some new wisdom about the human condition and a deeper perspective about the experiences of your own life.
22 Marilyn Green Faulkner Literature Depth Serious reading is not a passive activity; it is more like hiking or running, and it is rewarding in the same way. Harold Bloom calls it a "difficult pleasure." As with a long run or a challenging hike, one has to invest a lot of effort in a great book. The vocabulary may be unfamiliar, the imagery confusing, and the length of the book may call for a large commitment of time. Such a book asks a lot of you, but offers in return the same thrill you feel when you reach the top of the mountain or finish that marathon. The “high” one experiences after a great read is comparable to the “high” one experiences after a great run. It’s worth the effort!
23 Marilyn Green Faulkner Literature Greatness Every great book changes your life in some way, and a lifetime of reading great books can alter the course of your life.
24 Mark Twain Literature Books A big leather-bound volume makes an ideal razorstrap. A thin book is useful to stick under a table with a broken caster to steady it. A large, flat atlas can be used to cover a window with a broken pane. And a thick, old-fashioned heavy book with a clasp is the finest thing in the world to throw at a noisy cat.
25 Mark Twain Literature Books A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.
26 Mark Twain Literature Books The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them.
27 Micheal Flaherty Literature Stories Since it is so likely that they will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage.
28 Moses Hadas Literature Books I have read your book and much like it.
29 Nathaniel Hawthorn Literature Life The fault was mine. The page of life that was spread out before me seemed dull and commonplace, only because I had not fathomed its deeper import.
30 Randy Pausch Literature Stories Stories should be told for a reason...If you dispense your own wisdom, others often dismiss it. If you offer wisdom from a third party it seems less arrogant and more acceptable.
31 Robert Louis Stevenson Literature Speech All speech, written or spoken, is a dead language, until it finds a willing and prepared hearer.
32 Shakespeare Literature Integrity This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.
33 Shakespeare Literature Integrity To thine ownself be true then canst thou be false to any man.
34 Shakespeare Literature Doubt Our doubts are traitors and make us loose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt. Measure for Measure ActI.Sc.5
35 Shakespeare Literature Courage We must not stint our necessary actions, in the fear to cope malicious censurers. Henry VIII ACT 1 SC.2
36 Shakespeare Literature Wisdom When a wise man gives thee better counsel, give me mine again. King Lear Act II Sc. 1
37 Shakespeare Literature Old Age An old man is twice a child. Hamlet Act II Sc.2
38 Shakespeare Literature Action Strong reasons make strong actions. King John Act III Sc. 4
39 Shakespeare Literature Gratitude How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!
40 Shakespeare Literature Time Take all the swift advantage of the hours.
41 Shakespeare Literature Indecision I am at war twixt will and will not.
42 Shakespeare Literature Opportunity There is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in misery.
43 Shakespeare Literature Law Lawless are they that maketh their wills their law.
44 Shakespeare Literature Gratitude He is well paid That is well satisfied. Merchant of Venice Act IV Sc.
45 Shakespeare Literature Dishonesty Tis better to be lowly born, And range with humble livers in content,Than to be perk'd up in a glittering grief, And wear a golden sorrow. Henry VIII Act II Sc. 3
46 Shakespeare Literature Speech He jests at scars that never felt a wound.
47 Shakespeare Literature Conscience I feel within me A peace above all earthly dignities A still and quiet conscience.
48 Shakespeare Literature Dishonesty God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.
49 Shakespeare Literature Trials Everyone can master a grief but he that has it.
50 Shakespeare Literature Death Death lies on her, like an untimely frost Upon the sweetest flower of all the field. Romeo and Juliet. Act 1V Sc. 5
51 Shakespeare Literature Pretense All that glitters is not gold. Merchant of Venice ActII. Sc.7
52 Shakespeare Literature Doubt Modest doubt is call'd The Beacon of the wise.
53 Shakespeare Literature Good Intentions O, cunning enemy, that, to catch a saint, With saints dost bait thy hook! Measure for Measure ActII Sc.4
54 Shakespeare Literature Persistence Violent fires soon burn out themselves; Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short. Richard II Act. II Sc. 1
55 Shakespeare Literature Good Intentions How far your eyes may pierce, I cannot tell; Striving to better, oft we mar what's well. King Lear Act I. Sc. 4
56 Shakespeare Literature Sadness You have such a February face, So full of frost, of storm, and cloudiness.
57 Shakespeare Literature Courage He lives in fame that died in virtues cause.
58 Shakespeare Literature Honesty Go to your bosom; knock there; and ask your heart what it doth know. Measure for Measure Act II Sc. 2
59 Shakespeare Literature Mistakes They say, best men are molded out of faults; And, for the most, become much more the better For being a little bad: so may my husband. Measure for Measure Act V Sc. 1
60 Shakespeare Literature Public Opinion Was ever feather so lightly blown to and fro, as tis multitude? Henry VI Act. IV sc. 8
61 Shakespeare Literature Nature THIRD FISHERMAN: Master I marvel how the fishes live in the sea. FIRST FISHERMAN: Why, as men do a-land: the great ones eat up the little ones. Pericles Act II Sc. 1
62 Shakespeare Literature Fools The empty vessel makes the greatest sound.
63 Shakespeare Literature Speech Have more than thou showest, speak less than thou knowest.
64 T.S. Eliot Literature Discovery We must not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time.
65 Tennyson Literature Integrity My strength is as the strength of ten, because my heart is pure.
66 Thomas Jefferson Literature Books Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital.
67 Victor Hugo Literature Error Great blunders are often made, like large ropes, of a multitude of fibers.
68 Voltaire Literature Actions Every man is guilty of all the good he didn't do.
69 William Wordsworth Literature Reflection Habit rules the unreflecting herd.