1 – “Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why.”
– Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five
2 – “Alice could not help her lips curling up into a smile as she began: “Do you know, I always thought Unicorns were fabulous monsters, too? I never saw one alive before!”
“Well, now that we have seen each other,” said the Unicorn, “if you’ll believe in me, I’ll believe in you. Is that a bargain?”
– Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, chapter VII
3 – “I’ll publish right or wrong: Fools are my theme, let satire be my song.”
– Lord Byron, English Bards & Scotch Reviewers
4 – “I had only a little time left and I didn’t want to waste it on God.”
– Albert Camus, The Stranger
5 – “Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.”
– Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
6 – “I am a man, and men are animals who tell stories. This is a gift from God, who spoke our species into being, but left the end of our story untold. That mystery is troubling to us. How could it be otherwise? Without the final part, we think, how are we to make sense of all that went before: which is to say, our lives?
So we make stories of our own, in fevered and envious imitation of our Maker, hoping that we’ll tell, by chance, what God left untold. And finishing our tale, come to understand why we were born.”
– Clive Barker, Sacrament
7 – “When his life was ruined, his family killed, his farm destroyed, Job knelt down on the ground and yelled up to the heavens, “Why God? Why me?” and the thundering voice of God answered, “There’s just something about you that pisses me off”.
– Stephen King, Storm of the Century
8 – “The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her & leave her for the flies.”
– Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
9 – “And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about.”
– John Steinbeck, East of Eden
10 – “They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”
– Edgar Allen Poe, Eleonora
11 – “The poetry of heroism appeals irresistibly to those who don’t go to a war, and even more to those whom the war is making enormously wealthy. It’s always so.”
– Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Journey to the End of the Night
12 – “I’ve met God across his long walnut desk with his diplomas hanging on the wall behind him, and God asks me, “Why?” Why did I cause so much pain? Didn’t I realize that each of us is a sacred, unique snowflake of special unique specialness? Can’t I see how we’re all manifestations of love? I look at God behind his desk, taking notes on a pad, but God’s got this all wrong. We are not special. We are not crap or trash, either. We just are. We just are, and what happens just happens. And God says, “No, that’s not right.” Yeah. Well. Whatever. You can’t teach God anything.”
– Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
13 – “…they danced down the streets like dingledodies, and I shambled after as I’ve been doing all my life after people who interest me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue center light pop and everybody goes ‘Awww!’ “
– Jack Kerouac, On The Road
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A great list 🙂
These are great-thanks!
Great quotes! and I love the poop chute… I will have to send that to my SIL so my nieces can have the experience 😀
here’s my other link:
http://texasbookwoman.blogspot.com
Wow! Not ONE Oscar Wilde quote! That’s gotta be a first and THANK YOU for bringing ones out that are not normally shared!
These are great! Makes me want to go back and re-read some of the books.
Happy TT!
I don’t know which one I like the best. They are great and all from multiple sources. When you come across a good quote do you write it somewhere?
I’m afraid most of them are new to me, but your list is timely in one way because I’m about to start East of Eden. I read Camus years ago, and can’t remember a thing about him, so a re-read is called for.
That’s an amazing list. I don’ think I’ve seen a good chunk of them. I need to read more. (Says the girl who has enough books for three bookcases….)
Thanks for coming to my TT. (=
Great minds think alike? This is a great list. I love #3. Thanks for stopping by this morning, I love venturing to new blogs.
I’ve never heard that Tom Robbins quote before – excellent. 🙂
What an awesome list! I love literary quotes 🙂 One of my favorites is:
“There are times when we can feel destiny close around us like a fist around a doorknob. Sure, we can resist. But a knob that won’t turn, a door that sticks and never budges, is a nuisance to the gods. The gods may kick in the jamb. Worse, they may walk away in disgust, leaving us to hang dumbly from our tight hinges, deprived of any other chance in life to swing open into unnecessary risk and thus into enchantment.”
~ Tom Robbins, Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates
Happy Thursday!
Wow that’s a fantastic list!
Thanks for checking it out! I’m happy you liked it. 🙂
Those are BRILLIANT.
I’m trying to decide which I like best—I’m going to be bookmarking this page for future reference.
I had never seen the Stephen King one before (generally I stopped liking his stuff in around 1980)—that is HILARIOUS. And I also had forgotten all about the Bradbury one. Thanks for this…