Quotes on Literature

I told Terry I was leaving. She had been thinking about it all night and was resigned to it. Emotionlessly she kissed me in the vineyard and walked off down the row. We turned at a dozen paces, for love is a duel, and looked at each other for the last time.

As I made my way home, I thought Jem and I would get grown but there wasn't much else for us to learn, except possibly algebra.

Lying in bed, he would think of Heaven and London.

Ever'body's askin' that. "What we comin' to?" Seems to me we don't never come to nothin'. Always on the way.

I was a-trembling, because I'd got to decide, forever, betwixt two things, and I knowed it.

And they beat. The women for having known them and no more, no more; the children for having been them but never again. They killed a boss so often and so completely they had to bring him back to life to pulp him one more time. Tasting hot mealcake among pine trees, they beat it away. Singing love songs to Mr. Death, they smashed his head. More than the rest, they killed the flirt whom folks called Life for leading them on.

Here and there in the ancient literature we encounter legends of wise and mysterious games that were conceived and played by scholars, monks, or the courtiers of cultured princes. These might take the form of chess games in which the pieces and squares had secret meanings in addition to their usual functions.

I respect Millar, sir: he has raised the price of literature.

Cruel with guilt, and daring with despair, the midnight murderer bursts the faithless bar; invades the sacred hour of silent rest and leaves, unseen, a dagger in your breast.

The essay is a literary device for saying almost everything about almost anything

Literature is an investment of genius which pays dividends to all subsequent times.

Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.

There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.

Although a man may wear fine clothing, if he lives peacefully; and is good, self-possessed, has faith and is pure; and if he does not hurt any living being, he is a holy man.

Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.

Although a skillful flatterer is a most delightful companion if you have him all to yourself, his taste becomes very doubtful when he takes to complimenting other people.

Somebody said that I am the last American living the tragedy of Europe.

There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated.

Any man may be in good spirits and good temper when he's well dressed. There ain't much credit in that.

The worth of a civilization or a culture is not valued in the terms of its material wealth or military power, but by the quality and achievements of its representative individuals - its philosophers, its poets and its artists.

Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth, the man who would make his fortune no matter where he started.