Quotes by Authors - Page 26

Can’t this thing go any faster?” Thalia demanded.Zoe glared at her. “I cannot control traffic.”You both sound like my mother,” I said.Shut up!” they both said in union.
Rick Riordan
Hey, can I see that sword you were using?"I showed him Riptide, and explained how it turned from a pen into a sword just by uncapping it."Cool! Does it ever run out of ink?""Um, well, I don't actually write with it.""Are you really the son of Poseidon?""Well, yeah.""Can you surf really well, then?"I looked at Grover, who was trying hard not to laugh."Jeez, Nico," I said. "I've never really tried."He went on asking questions. Did I fight a lot with Thalia, since she was a daughter of Zeus? (I didn't answer that one.) If Annabeth's mother was Athena, the goddess of wisdom, then why didn't Annabeth know better than to fall off a cliff? (I tried not to strangle Nico for asking that one.) Was Annabeth my girlfriend? (At this point, I was ready to stick the kid in a meat-flavored sack and throw him to the wolves.)
Rick Riordan
Do you love her?' she asked him.'Always have,' he said.'Then why in the world would you leave her alone?
Suzanne Palmieri
There is nothing in man or nature that does not ask questions.
Curtis Bill Pepper
There are so many random questions in life, but the important ones harldy have a random answer.
Shannon L. Alder
In life; not all questions require gentle answers, some just want you to be so stupid to answer in a stupid way.
Auliq-Ice
Grandma calls it the Socratic Method. She considers it the highest pedagogical technique. I call it cornering a person. Instead of just telling you what I want you to know, I ambush you with questions. You try to escape, but you can’t. You can run whichever way you like, but in the end you’ll fall right into my trap.
Sophia Nikolaidou
Good questions are to be appreciated, not answered.
Raheel Farooq
Sometimes some questions... shouldn't been answered... sometimes some stuff should be kept private... sometimes some people should just exist in specific places...
Deyth Banger
She holds herself with such reserve. She smiles, but the smile doesn't reach her eyes, even in the company of the girls she's chosen to eat with. Why?I have no clue, and I really don't want to spend my time worrying about it. But my brain pushes at the question anyway.Why are people aloof?Because they don't want to let others in.Why don't they want to let others in?Well, sometimes because they're shy, and sometimes because they're convinced of their own superiority.But those aren't the only reasons. Sometimes it's because thay have something to hide.
Lauren Myracle
Just as Napoleon was the sole authority in the state, so the husband and father was to exercise authority over his family. Unfortunately the only possible result of despotism on either level is hypocrisy.
J. Christopher Herold
As for the third Official Reason: exposing Western Hypocrisy - how much more exposed can they be? Which decent human being on earth harbors any illusions about it? These are people whose histories are spongy with the blood of others. Colonialism, apartheid, slavery, ethnic cleansing, germ warfare, chemical weapons - they virtually invented it all.
Arundhati Roy
Ashe was typical of that strata of mankind which conducts its human relationships according to a principle of challenge and response. Where there was softness, he would advance; where he found resistance, retreat. Having himself no particular opinions or tastes he relied upon whatever conformed with those of his companion. He was as ready to drink tea at Fortnum's as beer at the Prospect of Whitby; he would listen to military music in St. James's Park or jazz in Compton Street cellar; his voice would tremble with sympathy when he spoke of Sharpeville, or with indignation at the growth of Britain's colored population. To Leamas this observably passive role was repellent; it brought out the bully in him, so that he would lead the other gently into a position where he was committed, and then himself withdraw, so that Ashe was constantly scampering back from some cul-de-sac into which Leamas had enticed him.
John le Carré
I have noticed more than once in life that a taste for the ineffably twee can go hand-in-hand with a distinctly uncharitable outlook on the world, I once shared an office with a woman who had covered the wall space behind her desk with pictures of fluffy kitties; she was the most bigoted, spiteful champion of the death penalty with whom it has ever been my misfortune to share a kettle.A love of all things saccharine often seems present where there is a lack of real warmth or charity.
J.K. Rowling
The Chinese food arrives. Delicious saliva fills his mouth. He really hasn't had any since Texas. He loves this food that contains no disgusting proofs of slain animals, a bloody slab of cow haunch, a hen's sinewy skeleton; these ghosts have been minced and destroyed and painlessly merged with the shapes of insensate vegetables, plump green bodies that invite his appetite's innocent gusto. Candy.
John Updike
Agnes: "I have a question for you, speaking of truth. You say God speaks the truth." Tóti: "Yes." Agnes: "And God said: 'Thou shalt not kill.'Tóti: "Yes. Tóti said carefully." Agnes: "Then Blondal and the rest are going against God. They're hypocrites. They say they are carrying out God's law but they are only doing the will of men.
Hannah Kent
You desire the end but close your eyes to the means. You want the garden to be beautiful, provided that the smell of manure is kept well away from your fastidious nose.
P.D. James
He said to the cardinal, "I'm a peasant, not instructed in the ways of heaven. But I have never broken my word. And you, a Cardinal of the Catholic Church, with all your holy garments and crosses of Jesus, lied to me like a heathen Moor. Your sacred office alone will not save your life.
Mario Puzo
Yes, it was a "beautiful" sermon, tugging the emotions and conjuring up pictures of greatness and peace. But were they talking about the decent peppery ordinary old man he knew, or had the subject strayed to the story of some saint of the past? Or were there perhaps two men being buried under the same name? One perhaps had shown himself to Ross, while the other had been reserved for the view of men like William-Alfred. Ross tried to remember Charles before he was ill, Charles with his love of cockfighting and his hearty appetite, with his perpetual flatulence and passion for gin, with his occasional generosities and meannesses and faults and virtues, like most men. There was some mistake somewhere. Oh well, this was a special occasion...But Charles himself would surely have been amused. Or would he have shed a tear with the rest for the manner of man who had passed away?
Winston Graham
Whereas Jesus and his disciples were distrusted by the state largely because they respected the poor and shared everything, the fundamentalists of the present hour would appear not to know that the poor exist.
James Baldwin
...some student asked if he [Larry Summers] didn’t have essentially the same relationship with Bob Rubin. Wasn’t Summer’s opposition to capital controls just a sop to Wall Street banks, which wanted to recoup their risky investments regardless of how doing so affected the country in which they had invested? “Summers just lost it,” said one audience member, a business school student. “he looked at the person and said, “you don’t know what you’re talking about and how dare you ask this question of the president of Harvard?
Richard Bradley
All these faces look happy enough, say Shug. Big and beefy. Eyes clear and innocent, like they don't know them other crooks on the front page. But they the same folks, she say.
Alice Walker
Before our "company" set off, at a wink from the officer, Plumpie stood up and proposed a search. I could see that some of the others thought she was wasting our time, but our company commander cheerfully seconded her proposal. He suggested we search him first. A boy was called to do this, and found a big bunch of keys on him. Our commander acted as though he had been genuinely careless, and gave Plumpie a victorious smile. The rest of us searched each other. This roundabout way of doing things reflected a Maoist practice: things had to look as though they were the wish of the people, rather than commands from above. Hypocrisy and playacting were taken for granted.
Jung Chang
In the days following the crash, an axiom as old as the Republic came into play once more. In good times Wall Street wanted Washington to leave it alone. In bad times it wanted Washington to act.
Haynes Johnson
The self-righteous scream judgments against others to hide the noise of skeletons dancing in their own closets.
John Mark Green
Hypocrisy annoys me, people need to look into mirrors. Let me hold a mirror in front of your face.
C. JoyBell C.
God she hated the dance. A blow to the cheek one minute and discussing a romantic getaway the next. It was the one step forward, two steps back waltz. She wanted to scream. Sitting on the side of the bed, Claire allowed herself tears and swallowed
Aleatha Romig
The real moments that changed the world are when church members miss the meaning of a whole sermon, and take no accountability for the testimonies they damage, by being self-righteous.
Shannon L. Alder
What do you know about insurance fraud?”I knew discussions of it were not likely to lead to sex.
Roberta Pearce
Hope meets a dead end when the only chance in sight comes to naught.
Pawan Mishra
Personal disillusionment accompanied by self-pity and self-loathing are the Achilles’ heel of modern humankind, representing the weakness of the human spirit.
Kilroy J. Oldster
What New England is, is a state of mind, a place where dry humor and perpetual disappointment blend to produce an ironic pessimism that folks from away find most perplexing
Willem Lange
My hopes were all dead --- struck with a subtle doom, such as, in one night, fell on all the first-born in the land of Egypt. I looked on my cherished wishes, yesterday so blooming and glowing; they lay stark, chill, livid corpses that could never revive. I looked at my love: that feeling which had been my master's --- which he had created; it shivered in my heart, like a suffering child in a cold cradle; sickness and anguish had seized it; it could not seek Mr Rochester's arms --- it could not derive warmth from his breast. Oh, never more could it turn to him; for faith was blighted -- confidence destroyed!
Charlotte Brontë
There should be no crying in copyediting.
Carol Fisher Saller
He has always been the kid who cries too easily and laughs too easily, the kid who begins giggling in church for no reason at all, who blinks hotly in shame and frustration whenever he misses a question in class, living in an otherland of sparkling daydreams and imaginary catastrophes.
Kevin Brockmeier
Looking silly can be very powerful. People who are committing and taking risks become the king and queen of my prom. People are their most beautiful when they are laughing, crying, dancing, playing, telling the truth and being chased in a fun way.
Amy Poehler
What’s up, Sam?”“What birthday?” he panted.“What?”“What birthday, Anna?”It took a while for her to absorb his fear. It took a while for the reason for his fear to dawn on her.“Fifteen,” Anna said in a whisper.“What’s the matter?” Emma asked, sensing her twin’s mood. “It doesn’t mean anything.”“It doesn’t,” Anna whispered.“You’re probably right,” Sam said.“Oh, my God,” Anna said. “Are we going to disappear?”“When were you born?” Sam asked. “What time of day?”The twins exchanged scared looks. “We don’t know.”“You know what, no one has blinked out since that first day, so it’s probably—”Emma disappeared.Anna screamed.The other older kids took notice, the littles, too.“Oh, my God!” Anna cried. “Emma. Emma. Oh, God!”She grabbed Sam’s hands and he held her tight.The prees, some of them, caught the fear. Mother Mary came over. “What’s going on? You’re scaring the kids. Where’s Emma?”Anna just kept saying, “Oh, my God,” and calling her sister’s name.“Where’s Emma?” Mary demanded again. “What’s going on?”Sam didn’t want to explain. Anna was hurting him with the pressure of her fingers digging into the backs of his hands. Anna’s eyes were huge, staring holes in him.“How far apart were you born?” Sam asked.Anna just stared in blank horror.Sam lowered his voice to an urgent whisper. “How far apart were you born, Anna?”“Six minutes,” she whispered.“Hold my hands, Sam,” she said.“Don’t let me go, Sam,” she said.“I won’t, Anna, I won’t let you go,” Sam said.“What’s going to happen, Sam?”“I don’t know, Anna.”“Will we go to where our mom and dad are?”“I don’t know, Anna."“Am I going to die?”“No, Anna. You’re not going to die.”“Don’t let go of me, Sam.”Mary was there now, a baby on her hip. John was there. The prees, some of them, watched with serious, worried looks on their faces.“I don’t want to die,” Anna repeated. “I…I don’t know what it’s like.”“It’s okay, Anna.”Anna smiled. “That was a nice date. When we went out.”“It was.”For a split second it was like Anna blurred. Too fast to be real. She blurred, and Sam could almost swear that she had smiled at him.And his fingers squeezed on nothing.For a terribly long time no one moved or said anything.The littles didn’t cry out. The older kids just stared.Sam’s fingertips still remembered the feel of Anna’s hands. He stared at the place where her face had been. He could still see her pleading eyes.Unable to stop himself, he reached a hand into the space she had occupied. Reaching for a face that was no longer there.Someone sobbed.Someone cried out, other voices then, the prees started crying.Sam felt sick. When his teacher had disappeared he hadn’t been expecting it. This time he had seen it coming, like a monster in a slow-motion nightmare. This time he had seen it coming, like standing rooted on the railroad tracks, unable to jump aside.
Michael Grant
Inside her head or out in the desert was the same, and the air inside her throat was very dry to keep from crying and her neck sore from forcing herself not to look down, not to look back.
Mike Bond
Death gets a bad rap. People think that euthanasia is putting their pets “down” when it really is lifting us up. In the first moment, when we come back to earth, we remember the comfort of the Heaven we came from and this is why we cry when we are born. When we are born in Heaven we come in laughing not crying! In birth we have the passage and then the pain. In death we have the pain and then the passage.
Kate McGahan
I began to cry but maintained my shouting through it, like a wind through sheets of rain.
Olivia Sudjic
One group of riders doped, the others alongside them racing clean. You can work out for yourselves which group was fastest.
David Millar
I bet they love those games on Friday night more than they do segregation.
Pat Conroy
It’s amazing how two thin pieces of clothing can hold such deep memories. Laughter, pain, victory, defeat, friendship, fatigue, elation… they’re all there, but only to the person who’s worn the uniform
Wendelin Van Draanen
I'd never been much of an athlete, due to a physical condition I'd had since birth (unathleticism). Perhaps if there were a sport centered around lying on your couch in a neurotic stupor all day, I'd take an interest.
Colson Whitehead
This message is brought to you by the BCBS [Booty Call Broadcasting System]. If you are back in town, get your wet ass over here." (The Hook Up, 42%)
Kristen Callihan
Basketball Rule #6A great teamhas a good scorerwith a teammatewho's on pointand readyto assist.
Kwame Alexander
Whereas fanatic is usually a pejorative word, a Fan is someone who has roots somewhere.
Simon Kuper
And then, some morning in the second week, the mind wakes, comes to life again. Not in a city sense—no—but beach-wise. It begins to drift, to play, to turn over in gentle careless rolls like those lazy waves on the beach. One never knows what chance treasures these easy unconscious rollers may toss up, on the smooth white sand of the conscious mind; what perfectly rounded stone, what rare shell from the ocean floor. Perhaps a channeled whelk, a moon shell, or even an argonaut.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Today is a gift.Today is all I have.I will be fully awake in today.
Lailah Gifty Akita
I am bewildering you a little. Just enough to help you forget what you came to believe, so that you can remember what you’ve always known.
Martha Beck
Seed mantras are the seeding suggestions to awaken the deep collective unconscious.
Amit Ray
I want to say that further you are not a great chief of this country. That you have no following, no power, no control." Logan continued, "You are on an Indian reservation merely at the sufferance of the government. You are fed by the government, clothed by the government, your children are educated by the government, and all you have and are today is because of the government. If it were not for the government you would be freezing and starving today in the mountains. I merely say these things to notify you that you cannot insult the people of the United States of America or its committees ...the government feeds and clothes and educates your children now, and desires to teach you to become farmers, and to civilize you, and make you as white men.-Senator John Logan, 1883
Dee Brown
Except for the field organizers of strikes, who were pretty tough monkeys and devoted, most of the so-called Communists I met were middle-class, middle-aged people playing a game of dreams. I remember a woman in easy circumstances saying to another even more affluent: 'After the revolution even we will have more, won't we, dear?' Then there was another lover of proletarians who used to raise hell with Sunday picknickers on her property.I guess the trouble was that we didn't have any self-admitted proletarians. Everyone was a temporarily embarrassed capitalist. Maybe the Communists so closely questioned by the investigation committees were a danger to America, but the ones I knew—at least they claimed to be Communists—couldn't have disrupted a Sunday-school picnic. Besides they were too busy fighting among themselves.
John Steinbeck
Marx called Darwin a plagiarist and Malthus a fraud. Now all Marxists are Malthusian Darwinists.
A.E. Samaan
Nine out of ten eugenicists in the 20th Century were also Progressives or Socialists, as central to the eugenic creed is the desire to engineer and centrally plan human reproduction and heredity. These were not people that believed in individual liberty. They certainly didn't believe the individual had the right to chose their own mate freely. They were statists, They were totalitarians at heart.
A.E. Samaan
Socialists eat their children. The poets, artists, and radicals are murdered first once statists come into power. Statists abhor free thinking.
A.E. Samaan
If you ask a conservative for a statement of his political convictions, he may well say that he has none, and that the greatest heresy of modernity is precisely to see politics as a matter of convictions as though one could recuperate, at the level of political purpose, the consoling certainty which once was granted by religious faith. In another sense, however, conservatism does rest in a system of belief, and is opposed as much to the theory as to the practice of socialist and liberal politics.
Roger Scruton
Socialists claim to be in favor of equitable redistribution of income and wealth, but who determines what is equitable and does the actual redistribution?
Dinesh D'Souza
Unappreciated because too many of his [Rudyard Kipling's] peers were socialists.
Jorge Luis Borges
Question: Which Mediterranean government shares all of Ronald Reagan's views on international terrorism, the present danger of Soviet advance, the hypocrisy of the United Nations, the unreliability of Europe, the perfidy of the Third World and the need for nuclear defense policy? Question: Which Mediterranean government is Ronald Reagan trying, with the help of George Shultz and Caspar Weinberger, to replace with a government led by a party which professes socialism and which contains extreme leftists?If you answered 'the government of Israel' to both of the above, you know more about political and international irony than the President does.
Christopher Hitchens