Useless Quotes - Page 24

• The man was useless as tits on a bull, but he didn't deserve to die like that.

  Nora Roberts

  Men, Bulls, Dies

  Nora Roberts (2007). “High Noon”, p.249, Penguin

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• Life is painful and disappointing. It is useless, therefore, to write new realistic novels. We generally know where we stand in relation to reality and don’t care to know any more.

  Michel Houellebecq

  Writing, Reality, Care

  Michel Houellebecq (2005). “H.P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life”, McSweeney's

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• Statistically speaking, there's a better chance that some part of me will go on to greatness somewhere in the world. I'd rather be partly great than entirely useless.

  Neal Shusterman

  Greatness, Goes On, World

  Neal Shusterman (2012). “Unwind Unboxed: Unwind; UnStrung: an Unwind story; UnWholly”, p.55, Simon and Schuster

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• A writer who is afraid to overreach himself is as useless as a general who is afraid to be wrong.

  Raymond Chandler

  Raymond Chandler (2002). “Trouble Is My Business: A Novel”, p.5, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

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• It is a law of nature we overlook, that intellectual versatility is the compensation for change, danger, and trouble. An animal perfectly in harmony with its environment is a perfect mechanism. Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no change and no need of change. Only those animals partake of intelligence that have a huge variety of needs and dangers.

  H. G. Wells

  Animal, Law, Perfect

  H. G. Wells “The Time Machine”, Games by CC

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• Every industrious man, in every lawful calling, is a useful man. And one principal reason why men are so often useless is that they neglect their own profession or calling, and divide and shift their attention among a multiplicity of objects and pursuits.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Men, Calling, Reason Why

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• How could people, I wondered for the ten thousandth useless time, how could people who had loved so dearly come to such a wilderness; and yet the change in us was irreversible, and neither of us would even search for a way back. It was impossible. The fire was out. Only a few live coals lurked in the ashes, searing unexpectedly at the incautious touch.

  Dick Francis

  Fire, People, Ashes

  Dick Francis (1981). “Whip hand: Trial run ; Twice shy”

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• She asks why I like her. Might as well ask Why I breathe. Maybe tomorrow I won't Breathe or like her Anymore. Maybe tomorrow the tides Will stop. Maybe tomorrow will bring No more rainbows. Maybe tomorrow She will stop Asking useless questions.

  Gail Carson Levine

  Maybe Tomorrow, Rainbow, Asking

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• The American mirror, said the voice, the sad American mirror of wealth and poverty and constant useless metamorphosis, the mirror that sails and whose sails are pain.

  Roberto Bolano

  Pain, Mirrors, Voice

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• The acquisition of knowledge is always of use to the intellect, because it may thus drive out useless things and retain the good. For nothing can be loved or hated unless it is first known.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Life, Useless Things, Acquisition

  Leonardo Da Vinci, General Press (2016). “The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci”, p.443, GENERAL PRESS

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• Nature, keeping only useless secrets, had placed within reach and in sight of human beings the things it was necessary for them to know.

  Michel Foucault

  Sight, Secret, Humans

  Michel Foucault (2012). “The History of Sexuality, Vol. 3: The Care of the Self”, p.65, Vintage

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• The trouble with us today, there are too many of us who put question marks instead of periods after what the Lord says. I want you to think about that. We shouldn't be concerned about why He said something, or whether or not it can be made so. Just trust the Lord. We don't try to find the answers or explanations. We shouldn't try to spend time explaining what the Lord didn't see fit to explain. We spend useless time.

  Harold B. Lee

  Thinking, Trying, Answers

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• The things other people have put into my head, at any rate, do not fit together nicely, are often useless and ugly, are out of proportion with one another, are out of proportion with life as it really is outside my head.

  Kurt Vonnegut

  People, Together, Ugly

  Kurt Vonnegut (1973). “Breakfast of champions: or, Goodbye blue Monday!”, Dell

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• Now you see,' said the turtle, drifting back into the pond, 'why it is useless to cry. Your tears do not wash away your sorrows. They feed someone else's joy. And that is why you must learn to swallow your own tears.

  Amy Tan

  Turtles, Joy, Sorrow

  Amy Tan (2006). “The Joy Luck Club”, p.217, Penguin

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• I had never wanted to be one of those girls in love with boys who would not have me. Unrequited love - plain desperate aboveboard boy-chasing - turned you into a salesperson, and what you were selling was something he didn't want, couldn't use, would never miss. Unrequited love was deciding to be useless, and I could never abide uselessness. Neither could James. He understood. In such situations, you do one of two things - you either walk away and deny yourself, or you do sneaky things to get what you need. You attend weddings, you go for walks. You say, yes. Yes, you're my best friend, too.

  Elizabeth McCracken

  Girl, Unrequited Love, Boys

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• But then he told himself: What does it really mean to be useful? Today's world, just as it is, contains the sum of the utility of all people of all times. Which implies: The highest morality consists in being useless.

  Milan Kundera

  Mean, People, Doe

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• And here I always thought morality was useless.

  Jeff Lindsay

  Morality

  "Darkly Dreaming Dexter". Book by Jeff Lindsay, Chapter 17, 2004.

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• When we did eventually get to the party - me walking next to Dad's Volvo driving at five miles an hour - I had a horrible time. Everyone laughed at first but then more or less ignored me. In a mood of defiant stuffed oliveness I did have a dance by myself but things kept crashing to the floor around me. The host asked if I would sit down. I had a go at that but it was useless. In the end I was at the gate for about an hour before Dad arrived.

  Louise Rennison

  Dad, Party, Next

  Louise Rennison (2013). “The Fab Confessions of Georgia Nicolson:”, p.10, HarperCollins UK

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• Kindness. The only possible method when dealing with a living creature. You'll get nowhere with an animal if you use terror, no matter what its level of development may be. That I have maintained, do maintain and always will maintain. People who think you can use terror are quite wrong. No, no, terror is useless, whatever its colour – white, red or even brown! Terror completely paralyses the nervous system.

  Mikhail Bulgakov

  Kindness, Thinking, Animal

  Mikhail Bulgakov (2005). “The Heart of a Dog”, Vintage Books USA

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• Never act like you want it, darlin'. Act like you wouldn't own it if they paid you. Tell them it's dirty, broken...a useless thing. Then make an offer.

  Billie Letts

  Dirty, Useless Things, Broken

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• Man designs for himself a garden with a hundred kinds of trees, a thousand kinds of flowers, a hundred kinds of fruit and vegetables. Suppose, then, that the gardener of this garden knew no other distinction between edible and inedible, nine-tenths of this garden would be useless to him. He would pull up the most enchanting flowers and hew down the noblest trees and even regard them with a loathing and envious eye. This is what the Steppenwolf does with the thousand flowers of his soul. What does not stand classified as either man or wolf he does not see at all.

  Hermann Hesse

  Flower, Eye, Men

  Hermann Hesse (1983). “Steppenwolf”, Bantam

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• Works of art are of an infinite solitude, and no means of approach is so useless as criticism. Only love can touch and hold them and be fair to them.

  Rainer Maria Rilke

  Art, Mean, Solitude

  Rainer Maria Rilke (2001). “Letters to a Young Poet”

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• I don't believe you know anything about a man like me or a country like this. It takes rough men, Miss Fair, to tame a rough country; rough men, but good men. Your father is in that class. As for you, I don't think you'd measure up, and you'll do well to leave it. You're a hothouse flower, very soft, very appealing and very useless...In the world you are going to, men want pretty useless women. They want toys for their lighte moments, and we have those women out here, too, only we have another name for them. We want women who can make a home, and if need be, handle a rifle.

  Louis L'Amour

  Country, Father, Believe

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• For a moment she turned in a circle, staring at her hands, which she held high and useless, close to her breast. She bobbed and shambled like an ape doing a trick, and her face was the silly, bewildered face of a joker's victim. And yet she could make no move that was not beautiful. Her trapped terror was more lovely than any joy that Molly had ever seen, and that was the most terrible thing about it.

  Peter S. Beagle

  Beautiful, Silly, Moving

  Peter S. Beagle (2003). “A fine and private place: The last unicorn”

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• Get up, you useless lump, get up!

  J. K. Rowling

  Get Up, Lumps

  J.K. Rowling (2015). “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”, p.26, Pottermore

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