Snaps Quotes - Page 14

• Mama used to tell us a story about a cicada sitting high in a tree. It chirps and drinks in dew, oblivious to the praying mantis behind it. The mantis arches up its front leg to stab the cicada, but it doesn't know an oriole perches behind it. The bird stretches out its neck to snap up the mantis for a midday meal, but its unaware of the boy who's come into the garden with a net. Three creatures—the cicada, the mantis and the oriole—all coveted gains without being aware of the greater and inescapable danger that was coming.

  Lisa See

  Boys, Garden, Praying Mantis

  12 Copy quote

• I can snap your spine like a toothpick.

  Dave Barry

  Spine, Toothpicks, I Can

  9 Copy quote

• Brownstein's is a fresh and jaunty voice, with a jazz snap all his own.

  Tama Janowitz

  Voice, Jazz

  4 Copy quote

• In the middle of a play, I go crazy and don't realize what I'm doing. I'll snap back to reality and I realize, 'Hey, I just ripped that boy's helmet off,' or, 'I'm over here twisting this guy's knee.

  Brian Bosworth

  Crazy, Boys, Reality

  4 Copy quote

• The novella is at once the most elegant and demanding form: a writer must balance the looseness of a novel with the concision of a short story, a feat that only the bravest and most talented of us can manage. In Brazil, Jesse Lee Kercheval proves, yet again, that she is exactly the right writer for the job. A wild American picaresque, Brazil snaps along briskly, yet feels full-fleshed, and brims with a sly wit and grace.

  Lauren Groff

  Jobs, Grace, Balance

  4 Copy quote

• The purpose of all our explanations is not to have you understand anything, but for you to snap from the understanding of the intellect to the understanding of pure spirit. All our explanations work backwards.

  Frederick Lenz

  Buddhist, Understanding, Purpose

  4 Copy quote