Literature Quotes - Page 50

Wit is an explosion of the compound spirit.

What is lost in the good or excellent translation is precisely the best.

Beauty is that which is simultaneously attractive and sublime.

In the streets through which we passed, I must own the houses in general struck me as if they were dark and gloomy, and yet at the same time they also struck me as prodigiously great and majestic.

Scandal begins when the police put a stop to it.

He who does without the praise of the crowd will not deny himself an opportunity to be his own adherent.

The trouble with Germans is not that they fire shells, but that they engrave them with quotations from Kant.

Wherever on this planet ideals of personal freedom and dignity apply, there you will find the cultural inheritance of England.

"And they lived happily ever after" is one of the most tragic sentences in literature. It's tragic because it's falsehood. It is a myth that has led generations to expect something from marriage that is not possible.

He knew everything about literature except how to enjoy it.

A man's most open actions have a secret side to them.

Bad literature is a form of treason.

Those Marriages generally abound most with Love and Constancy, that are preceded by a long Courtship.

Without the faintest possibility of finding a job, I decided to devote myself to literature: it was about time to find out what I was worth as a writer.

The things that are said in literature are always the same. What is important is the way they are said.

The proper words in the proper places are the true definition of style.

We are so fond on one another because our ailments are the same.

Truth should not be forced; it should simply manifest itself, like a woman who has in her privacy reflected and coolly decided to bestow herself upon a certain man.

Religion enables us to ignore nothingness and get on with the jobs of life.

Words are but pictures of our thoughts.

I learned a lot of things about literature talking to people at the publishing company. Did you know that about 90 percent of celebrity autobiographies are ghostwritten?

Every person above the ordinary has a certain mission that they are called to fulfill.

I'm in the civil discourse business. I think it takes all kinds. And more power to everybody.

To flatter and follow others, without being flattered and followed in turn, is but a state of half enjoyment.

Laugh as much as you choose, but you will not laugh me out of my opinion.