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E. M. Forster Quotes - Page 6

All Quotes Adventure Age Art Atheism Belief Character Children Creativity Criticism Culture Curiosity Darkness Democracy Desire Earth Evil Fate Feelings Fighting Friendship Giving Heart Heaven Hills History Home Horror House Human Nature Husband Imagination Inspirational Joy Judging Language Life Literature Logic Love Luck Lying Memories Passion Past Poetry Reading Romance Romantic Love Running Sleep Society Sorrow Soul Stupidity Sunshine Teaching Tolerance Understanding Universe Values War Writing

I have always found writing pleasant and don't understand what people mean by 'throes of creation.'

I have always found writing pleasant and don't understand what people mean by 'throes of creation.'

Writing, Mean, People

Just as words have two functions - information and creation - so each human mind has two personalities, one on the surface, one deeper down. The upper personality... is conscious and alert... The lower personality is a... perfect fool, but without it there is no literature.

Creativity, Two, Perfect

There was something better in life than this rubbish, if only he could get to it—love—nobility—big spaces where passion clasped peace, spaces no science could reach, but they existed for ever, full of woods some of them, and arched with majestic sky and a friend. . .

Passion, Sky, Space

Sudden conversion ... is particularly attractive to the half-baked mind.

Mind, Atheism, Half

Was Mrs. Wilcox one of the unsatisfactory people- there are many of them- who dangle intimacy and then withdraw it? They evoke our interests and affections, and keep the life of the spirit dawdling around them. Then they withdraw. When physical passion is involved, there is a definite name for such behaviour- flirting- and if carried far enough, it is punishable by law. But no law- not public opinion, even- punishes those who coquette with friendship, though the dull ache that they inflict, the sense of misdirected effort and exhaustion, may be as intolerable. Was she one of these?

Passion, Flirting, Law

E. M. Forster (2013). “Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)”, p.585, Delphi Classics

Neanderthal man listened to stories, if one may judge by the shape of his skull. The primitive audience was an audience of shock-heads, gaping around the camp-fire, fatigued with contending against the mammoth or wooly-rhinoceros, and only kept awake by suspense. What would happen next? The novelist droned on, and as soon as the audience guessed what happened next, they either fell asleep or killed him.

Men, Editors, Skulls

Humility is a quality for which I have only a limited admiration. In many phases of life it is a great mistake and degenerates into defensiveness or hypocrisy.

Mistake, Humility, Hypocrisy

E. M. Forster (2010). “Aspects of the Novel”, p.183, RosettaBooks

All a child's life depends on the ideal it has of its parents. Destroy that and everything goes — morals, behaviour, everything. Absolute trust in some one else is the essence of education.

Children, Essence, Parent

"Where Angels Fear to Tread: England Literature".

The kingdom of music is not the kingdom of this world; it will accept those whom breeding and intellect and culture have alike rejected. The commonplace person begins to play, and shoots into the empyrean without effort, whilst we look up, marvelling how he has escaped us, and thinking how we could worship him and love him, would he but translate his visions into human words, and his experiences into human actions. Perhaps he cannot; certainly he does not, or does so very seldom.

Thinking, Play, Effort

E. M. Forster (2014). “Great Novels of E. M. Forster: Where Angels Fear to Tread, The Longest Journey, A Room with a View, Howards End”, p.482, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

The more highly public life is organized the lower does its morality sink.

Organization, Doe, Literature

"What I Believe". Essay by E. M. Forster, "The Nation", July 16, 1938.

Do we find happiness so often that we should turn it off the box when it happens to sit there?

Finding Happiness, Should, Boxes

E. M. Forster (2013). “Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)”, p.399, Delphi Classics

The middle age of buggers is not to be contemplated without horror.

Age, Horror, Middle

It is so difficult - at least, I find it difficult - to understand people who speak the truth.

People, Speak, Difficult

E. M. Forster (2013). “Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)”, p.356, Delphi Classics

Human beings have their great chance in the novel.

Chance, Novel, Humans

E. M. Forster (2010). “Aspects of the Novel”, p.241, RosettaBooks

When that strange race nears the dust and is condemned as untouchable, then nature remembers the physical perfection that she accomplished elsewhere, and throws out a god-not many, but one here and there, to prove to society how little its categories impress her.

Race, Dust, Perfection

If human nature does alter it will be because individuals manage to look at themselves in a new way. Here and there people - a very few people, but a few novelists are among them - are trying to do this. Every institution and vested interest in against such a search: organized religion, the state, the family in its economic aspect, have nothing to gain, and it is only when outward prohibitions weaken that it can proceed: history conditions it to that extent.

People, Atheism, Trying

"Aspects of the Novel". Book by E. M. Forster, 1927.

I do like Christmas on the whole.... In its clumsy way, it does approach Peace and Goodwill. But it is clumsier every year.

Christmas, Holiday, Years

E. M. Forster (2016). “Howards End: England Literature”, p.68, 谷月社

They had nothing in common but the English language.

Common, Language, English Language

E.M. Forster (2015). “Howards End”, p.308, Sheba Blake Publishing

History develops, art stands still.

Art, History, Literature

E. M. Forster (2010). “Aspects of the Novel”, p.39, RosettaBooks

At the moment they vanished they were everywhere, the cool benediction of the night descended, the stars sparkled, and the whole universe was a hill.

Stars, Night, Hills

E. M. Forster (2010). “A Passage to India”, p.191, RosettaBooks

Words deserted him immediately. He could only speak when he was not asked to.

Speak, Deserted

When love flies it is remembered not as love but as something else.

Remembered

"Maurice". Book by E. M. Forster, part two, 1971.

The tragedy of preparedness has scarcely been handled, save by the Greeks. Life is indeed dangerous, but not in the way morality would have us believe. It is indeed unmanageable, but the essence of it is not a battle. It is unmanageable because it is a romance, and its essence is romantic beauty.

Believe, Essence, Romance

E. M. Forster (2013). “Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)”, p.606, Delphi Classics

He educated Maurice, or rather his spirit educated Maurice's spirit, for they themselves became equal. Neither thought "Am I led; am I leading?" Love had caught him out of triviality and Maurice out of bewilderment in order that two imperfect souls might touch perfection.

Order, Two, Perfection

Don't go fighting against the Spring.

Spring, Fighting

E.M. Forster (2016). “A Room With a View (Diversion Classics)”, p.71, Diversion Books

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