Written Quotes - Page 22

• I go through a lot of bad stuff, because most of the stuff that's written is pretty bad. But occasionally something comes along that's good, and I want to do it.

  Joseph Gordon-Levitt

  Want, Stuff, Bad Stuff

  Interview with Scott Tobias, www.avclub.com. March 28, 2007.

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• I never think of poetry or the poetry scene, only separate poems written by individuals.

  Philip Larkin

  Thinking, Scene, Individual

  Philip Larkin (2013). “Further Requirements”, p.49, Faber & Faber

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• Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness is the perfect companion to Mindfulness in Plain English. Written with the thoroughness and the masterful simplicity so characteristic of his teaching, Bhante Gunaratana presents essential guidelines for turning the Buddha's teachings on the Eightfold Path into living wisdom.

  Larry Rosenberg

  Teaching, Eight, Perfect

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• Reviewing a book written by someone you're living with and sleeping with is, needless to say, wrong.

  Jill Lepore

  Book, Sleep

  Jill Lepore (2014). “The Secret History of Wonder Woman”, p.163, Vintage

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• The first step to finding a God-written love story is handing the pen to the true Author of romance.

  Leslie Ludy

  Romance, Stories, Firsts

  Leslie Ludy (2009). “Authentic Beauty, Going Deeper: A Study Guide for the Set-Apart Young Woman”, p.71, Multnomah

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• Grace Kelly was written after these musicians were trying to mold me into what I should be. I was really angry and so I wrote the song and mailed them the lyrics. They didn't call me back, but two years later it's come full circle.

  Mika

  Song, Years, Circles

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• He was born a King. The wise men came from the East and asked, 'Where is He that is born King of the Jews?' (Matthew 2:2). He died a King.
  In Greek, in Latin, and in Hebrew the description was written above His cross, 'This is Jesus, The King' (Matthew 27:37)

  W. A. Criswell

  Wise, Jesus, Kings

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• If it is a distinction to have written a good book, it is also a disgrace to have written a bad one.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Book, Writing, Distinction

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• Great literature has always been written in a like spirit, and is, indeed, the Forgiveness of Sin, and when we find it becoming the Accusation of Sin, as in George Eliot, who plucks her Tito in pieces with as much assurance as if he had been clockwork, literature has begun to change into something else.

  William Butler Yeats

  Pieces, Literature, Becoming

  William Butler Yeats (2017). “Ideas of Good and Evil”, p.79, Litres

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• Everyone who has ever written will have discovered that writing always awakens something which, though it lay within us, we failed clearly to recognize before.

  Georg C. Lichtenberg

  Writing, Lays

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• I love to read the dedications of old books written in monarchies for they invariably honor some (usually insignificant) knight or duke with fulsome words of sycophantic insincerity, praising him as the light of the universe (in hopes, no doubt, for a few ducats to support future work); this old practice makes me feel like such an honest and upright man, by comparison, when I put a positive spin, perhaps ever so slightly exaggerated, on a grant proposal.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Book, Dedication, Men

  "Dinosaur in a Haystack". Book by Stephen Jay Gould, "The Razumovsky Duet" (p. 263), 1995.

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• I am particularly fond of [Emmanuel Mendes da Costa's] Natural History of Fossils because this treatise, more than any other work written in English, records a short episode expressing one of the grand false starts in the history of natural science and nothing can be quite so informative and instructive as a juicy mistake.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Mistake, Fossils, Emmanuel

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• I curse in everyday life, but usually when I stub my toe. The topics I'm discussing, it's not necessary to curse. I found [cursing] is a sign that a joke is not finished or well-written.

  Jim Gaffigan

  Everyday, Toes, Topics

  "He's bringing home the bacon, from clubs to Super Bowl ads". "The Plain Dealer" Newspaper, February 9, 2007.

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• Written words differ from spoken words in being material structures. A spoken word is a process in the physical world, having an essential time-order; a written word is a series of pieces of matter, having an essential space-order.

  Bertrand Russell

  Order, Space, Essentials

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell”, p.81, Routledge

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• Sometimes I pick up a book and I say: Well, so you've written it first, have you? Good for you. O.K., then I won't have to write it.

  Doris Lessing

  Book, Writing, Firsts

  Doris May Lessing (1981). “The Golden Notebook”, Bantam

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• In living literature no person is a competent judge but of works written in his own language. I have expressed my opinion concerning a number of English writers; it is very possible that I may be mistaken, that my admiration and my censure may be equally misplaced, and that my conclusions may appear impertinent and ridiculous on the other side of the Channel.

  François-René de Chateaubriand

  Numbers, Judging, May

  "Sketches of English Literature: With Considerations on the Spirit of the Times, Men, and Revolutions". Book by François-René de Chateaubriand, translated by Henry Colburn, Volume II, p.36, 1836.

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• Today's literature: prescriptions written by patients.

  Karl Kraus

  Literature, Today, Patient

  Aphorism collected in Heinrich Fischer (ed) Beim Wort genommen (1955). Translated by Harry Zohn in Half-truths and one-and-a-half truths (1986).

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• Could Hamlet have been written bya committee, or the Mona Lisa painted by a club? Could the NewTestament have been composed as a conference report?

  Alfred Whitney Griswold

  Clubs, Mona Lisa, Conferences

  1957 Baccalaureate address, 9 Jun.

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• My name will be written in fiery letters on the Champs Elysees.

  Yves Saint Laurent

  Names, Letters, Fiery

  "The saint: Yves Saint Laurent". Interview with Susannah Frankel, www.dazeddigital.com. March 2000.

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• If poetry were nothing but texture, [Dylan] Thomas would be as good as any poet alive. The what of his poems is hardly essential to their success, and the best and most brilliantly written pieces usually say less than the worst.

  Randall Jarrell

  Essentials, Would Be, Pieces

  "Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964". Book by Randall Jarrell,"Poetry in a Dry Season" (p. 36), 1980.

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• It amazes me that filmmakers will still film, and audiences will still watch, relationships so bankrupt of human feeling that the characters could be reading dialogue written by a computer.

  Roger Ebert

  Reading, Character, Feelings

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• Much has been written about Generation X and the films about it. Clerks is so utterly authentic that its heroes have never heard of their generation. When they think of "X," it's on the way to the video store.

  Roger Ebert

  Hero, Thinking, Clerks

  Roger Ebert (1996). “Roger Ebert's Video Companion, 1997 Edition”, Andrews McMeel Pub

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• I have read many definitions of what is a conservationist, and written not a few myself, but I suspect that the best one is written not with a pen, but with an axe. It is a matter of what a man thinks about while chopping, or while deciding what to chop. A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke he is writing his signature on the face of his land.

  Aldo Leopold

  Writing, Men, Thinking

  Aldo Leopold (1989). “A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There”, p.68, Oxford University Press, USA

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• The censor is always quick to justify his function in terms that are protective of society. But the First Amendment, written in terms that are absolute, deprives the States of any power to pass on the value, the propriety, or the morality of a particular expression.

  William O. Douglas

  Expression, Freedom Of Speech, Firsts

  "Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U.S. 413". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. March 21, 1966.

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• The great advantage of our system of government over all others, is, that we have a written constitution, defining its limits, and prescribing its authorities; and that, however, for a time, faction may convulse the nation, and passion and party prejudice sway its functionaries, the season of reflection will recur, when calmly retracing their deeds, all aberrations from fundamental principle will be corrected.

  Henry Clay

  Party, Passion, Reflection

  Henry Clay (2015). “The Papers of Henry Clay: The Rising Statesman, 1797-1814”, p.537, University Press of Kentucky

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