Quotes by Editors - Page 16

I've handed life and death back to the people who do the living and the dying.
Alfred Bester
When I got home, I seemed in a dream. My windows looked upon hers; I remained all the day looking at them, and all the day they were closed and dark. I forgot everything for this woman; I slept not, I eat nothing. That evening I fell into a fever, the next morning I was delirious, and the next evening I was DEAD!' 'Dead!' cried his hearers. 'Dead!' answered the narrator, with a conviction in his voice which words alone cannot give; 'dead as Fabian, the cast of whose dead face hangs from that wall!''Go on,' whispered the others, holding their breath.The hail still rattled against the windows, and the fire had so nearly died out, that they threw more wood on the feeble flame which penetrated the darkness of the studio and cast a faint light upon the pale face of him who told the story. ("The Dead Man's Story
James Hain Friswell
I'm a master of story. Almost a living fiction myself, so resilient am I! Spider-Man beats me down, I rise! Daredevil imprisons me, I escape! That's because stories have power! He who controls the narrative controls the audience, and you're all the audience, every one of you. As they say, the world's a stage...
Mark Waid
Everyone and everything needed to be raised to its highest level – the teacher must become a mage, the husband a knight errant, the labor a hero in a sacred drama – intensified, rarefied, baptized in the turbulent waters of restlessness, curiosity, and ardor.
Philip Zaleski
Christian myth, reveals the truth that "the Christian was (and is) still like his forefathers a mortal hemmed into a hostile world.
Philip Zaleski
You can only do what you can, and what doesn't get done, just doesn't get done.
Will Schwalbe
The difference between the modern laws and those of the past is that wisdom is no longer a respected requirement and it has become secondary in importance to bureaucratic procedure.
Gwendolyn Taunton
What's law? Control? Law filters chaos and what drips through? Serenity? Law -- our highest ideal and our basest nature. Don't look too closely at the law. Do, and you'll find the rationalized interpretations, the legal casuistry, the precedents of convenience. You'll find the serenity, which is just another word for death.
Frank Herbert
Most civilisation is based on cowardice. It's so easy to civilize by teaching cowardice. You water down the standards which would lead to bravery. You restrain the will. You regulate the appetites. You fence in the horizons. You make a law for every movement. You deny the existence of chaos. You teach even the children to breathe slowly. You tame.
Frank Herbert
I have said: "Blow out the lamp! Day is here!" And you keep saying: "Give me a lamp so I can find the day.
Frank Herbert
I really think I'd be better at, like, advanced napping techniques.
Tui T. Sutherland
Any school for free citizens must begin by teaching distrust, not trust. It must teach questioning, not acceptance of stock answers.
Brian Herbert
Probably every subject is interesting if an avenue into it can be found that has humanity and that an ordinary person can follow.
William Zinsser
Writing can be taught or learned in the vacuum. We must say to students in every area of knowledge: "This is a how other people have written about this subject. Read it; study it; think about it. You can do it too.
William Zinsser
One of underestimated tasks in nonfiction writing is to impose narrative shape on an unwieldy mass of material.
William Zinsser
The purpose of teachers should be to add to the sum of human knowers rather than the sum of human knowledge.
Stuart Sherman
So you'll teach me?" Val asked.Ravus nodded agin. "I will make you as terrible as you desire.""I don't want to be - ," she started, but he held up his hand."I know you're very brave," he said."Or st
Holly Black
All the world seemed suddenly dream, for in what waking world would a prince deceive his own people for the benefit of a slave? ~ Ayden
Rachel Haimowitz
I became intent on saving him through showing him that he was loved.
Joyce Johnson
The studio was immense and gloomy, the sole light within it proceeding from a stove, around which the three were seated. Although they were bold, and of the age when men are most jovial, the conversation had taken, in spite of their efforts to the contrary, a reflection from the dull weather without, and their jokes and frivolity were soon exhausted.In addition to the light which issued from the crannies in the stove, there was another emitted from a bowl of spirits, which was ceaselessly stirred by one of the young men, as he poured from an antique silver ladle some of the flaming spirit into the quaint old glasses from which the students drank. The blue flame of the spirit lighted up in a wild and fantastic manner the surrounding objects in the room, so that the heads of old prophets, of satyrs, or Madonnas, clothed in the same ghastly hue, seemed to move and to dance along the walls like a fantastic procession of the dead; and the vast room, which in the day time sparkled with the creations of genius, seemed now, in its alternate darkness and sulphuric light, to be peopled with its dreams.Each time also that the silver spoon agitated the liquid, strange shadows traced themselves along the walls, hideous and of fantastic form. Unearthly tints spread also upon the hangings of the studio, from the old bearded prophet of Michael Angelo to those eccentric caricatures which the artist had scrawled upon his walls, and which resembled an army of demons that one sees in a dream, or such as Goya has painted; whilst the lull and rise of the tempest without but added to the fantastic and nervous feeling which pervaded those within.Besides this, to add to the terror which was creeping over the three occupants of the room, each time that they looked at each other they appeared with faces of a blue tone, with eyes fixed and glittering like live embers, and with pale lips and sunken cheeks; but the most fearful object of all was that of a plaster mask taken from the face of an intimate friend but lately dead, which, hanging near the window, let the light from the spirit fall upon its face, turned three parts towards them, which gave it a strange, vivid, and mocking expression.All people have felt the influence of large and dark rooms, such as Hoffmann has portrayed and Rembrandt has painted; and all the world has experienced those wild and unaccountable terrors - panics without a cause - which seize on one like a spontaneous fever, at the sight of objects to which a stray glimpse of the moon or a feeble ray from a lamp gives a mysterious form; nay, all, we should imagine, have at some period of their lives found themselves by the side of a friend, in a dark and dismal chamber, listening to some wild story, which so enchains them, that although the mere lighting of a candle could put an end to their terror, they would not do so; so much need has the human heart of emotions, whether they be true or false. So it was upon the evening mentioned. The conversation of the three companions never took a direct line, but followed all the phases of their thoughts; sometimes it was light as the smoke which curled from their cigars, then for a moment fantastic as the flame of the burning spirit, and then again dark, lurid, and sombre as the smile which lit up the mask from their dead friend's face.At last the conversation ceased altogether, and the respiration of the smokers was the only sound heard; and their cigars glowed in the dark, like Will-of-the-wisps brooding o'er a stagnant pool.It was evident to them all, that the first who should break the silence, even if he spoke in jest, would cause in the hearts of the others a start and tremor, for each felt that he had almost unwittingly plunged into a ghastly reverie. ("The Dead Man's Story")
James Hain Friswell
Her screams spiraled up into the night air
Holly Black
Hollow slogans like "Making your country great again" only lead to one result, collapse.
Paul Levitz
Life is hard. People can't be trusted. Vigilance is key. Be wise about whom you love, and when you do love, do it with every fiber of your being...'til death do you part.
David DiBenedetto
Maybe before you start flirting with boys and kissing boys and trying to date boys, you should know who you are and where you stand.
Jill Santopolo
Until you get to know them in person, anyone you correspond with online remains a stranger.
Michael Miller
I point out to you, Marcus Claire Luyseyal, a lesson from past over-machined societies which you appear not to have learned. The devices themselves condition theusers to employ each other the way they employ machines.
Frank Herbert
As we've come to realize, the idea that security starts and ends with the purchase of a prepackaged firewall is simply misguided
Art Wittmann
When we asked college students how they adapted to the tidal wave of new technology, one explained, "It's only technology if it happened after you were born.
Arthur Levine
Technology tends toward avoidance of risks by investors. Uncertainty is ruled out if possible. People generally prefer the predictable. Few recognize how destructive this can be, how it imposes severe limits on variability and thus makes whole populations fatally vulnerable to the shocking ways our universe can throw the dice.
Frank Herbert
Let pressure pass over and through you. That way you can't be harmed by it.
Brian Herbert
What delicious abandon in the sleep of the child. Where do we lose it?
Frank Herbert
You must teach me the way you thrust your worries aside and turn to practical matters.
Frank Herbert
Even through the dulling effects of the pill, he wanted to be rid of his itching brain, his ignited skin, the flesh beneath, to in some way become so ethereal and Unbound to the earth that he could unsee, disavow, disavow
Jeff VanderMeer
No matter what I accomplish, it doesn't seem like much compared to surviving Auschwitz.
Art Spiegelman
Survival of the generic.
Siobhan Vivian
Perhaps the only happily ever after is to survive to tell the story
Kat Howard
Clinging to any form of conservatism can be dangerous. Become too conservative and you are unprepared for surprises. You cannot depend on luck. Logic is blind and often knows only its own past. Logic is good for playing chess but is often too slow for the needs of survival.
Frank Herbert
It is true that all of us are the beneficiaries of crimes committed by our ancestors, and it is true that nothing can be done about that now because the victims are dead and the survivors are innocent. These are good reasons for keeping our mouths shut about the past: but tell me, what are our reasons for silence about atrocities still to come?
Damon Knight
Of course you could do more - you can always do more, and you should do more - but still, the important things is to do what you can, whenever you can. You just do your best, and that's all you can do. Too many people use the excuse that they don't think they can do enough, so they decide they don't have to to do anything. There's never a good excuse for not doing anything - even if it's just to sign something, or send a small contribution, or invite a newly settled refugee family over for Thanksgiving.
Will Schwalbe
The bump of ego on his skull had swollen large, so he saw the whole world in terms of what it could give him.
Frederik Pohl
Remember at the junior picnic, when someone whipped that dog at Jennifer's head? And Jennifer was laughing, like it was funny? Ted never copped to it, but I know he did it. I saw him. A-hole.'Rachel shakes her head in disgust. 'She probably deals with that kind of crap every day...''That's it. I'm going to ask Jennifer if she wants to sit with us today... I don't like those little turds thinking they can make fun of her because she's on the list. Don't they have any respect for the fact that she's a senior? If she's with us, they wouldn't dare say anything.
Siobhan Vivian
Perhaps [he had] persevered for too long, in the face of too many obstacles, his hair proof of his tenacity - the stark black streaked with white or, in certain light, stark white shot through with black, each strand of white attributable to the jungle fever (so cold it burned, his skin glacial), each strand of black a testament to being alive afterwards.
Jeff VanderMeer
There is a saying: Genius is perseverance. While genius does not consist entirely of editing, without editing it's pretty useless.
Susan Bell
Thick is the darkness-- Sunward, O, sunward!Rough is the highway-- Onward, still onward!Dawn harbors surely East of the shadows.Facing us somewhere Spread the sweet meadows.Upward and forward! Time will restore us:Light is above us, Rest is before us.
William Ernest Henley
I looked not for shooting stars but for fixed ones, and I would try to imagine what kind of life lived in those celestial tidal pools so far from us.
Jeff VanderMeer
A smile is the universal welcome.
Max Eastman
One of these days I'm gonna beat him in the face with the butt of my service revolver until an eyeball pops out. These are the thoughts that keep me happy.
John Layman
The convoluted wording of legalisms grew up around the necessity to hide from ourselves the violence we intend toward each other. Between depriving a man of one hour from his life and depriving him of his life there exists only a difference of degree. You have done violence to him, consumed his energy. Elaborate euphemisms may conceal your intent to kill, but behind any use of power over another the ultimate assumption remains: "I feed on your energy.
Frank Herbert
We must realize that violence is not confined to physical violence. Fear is violence, caste discrimination is violence, exploitation of others, however subtle, is violence, segregation is violence, thinking ill of others and condemning others are violence. In order to reduce individual acts of physical violence, we must work to eliminate violence at all levels, mental, verbal, personal, and social, including violence to animals, plants, and all other forms of life.
Satish Kumar
For twenty years and more the whole planet had been bombed, raped, ravaged, and gouged by people whose fury had so exceeded their judgment that the only thing they could think of to do to express their discontent was to kill somebody.
Frederik Pohl
New York City is a tinderbox. The Sons of the Serpent - a white supremacist group with a twisted history, deep pockets, and long reach - declared it a combat zone. As they have many times before, they're unashamedly ginning bigotry and hatred into violence and bloodshed. But this time, they've gotten smart about it. Instead of parading through the streets in hoods and robes... they've gone undercover. Dozens upon dozens of them, hiding inside the New York justice system so they can control the law. Control the people. And as God is my witness, I will drive them out and strike them down... no matter what the cost.
Mark Waid
... and what happened next?
Stories All-New Tales Neil Gaiman
The longing for Joy is in itself Joy. When he recalled when he had experienced Joy, he was, in that recollection, experiencing Joy anew, though he knew it not. Joy was not a state; it was an arrow pointing to something beyond all states, something objective yet unattainable – at least in our earthly existence.
Philip Zaleski
J.R.R. Tolkien told a questioning correspondent, life's purpose is to know, praise, and thank God.
Philip Zaleski
All images and sensations, if idolatrously mistaken for Joy itself, soon honestly confessed themselves inadequate. All said, in a last resort, "It is not high. I am only a reminder. Look! Look! What do I remind you of?" CS Lewis
Philip Zaleski
I said to all the things that throng about the gateways of the senses: "Tell me of my God, since you are not He. Tell me something of Him." And they cried out in a great voice: "He made us." CS Lewis
Philip Zaleski
The most carefully crafted language in our culture tends to be poetry. And poetry at its finest moments subverts our best attempts at hiding from reality...The poetry of liturgy has just this power. The liturgy contains words that have been shaped and crafted over the centuries. It is formal speech. It is public poetry. As such it reaches into us to reveal not only the unnamed reality of our lives but the God who created us...But even when the words of the liturgy are not literally biblical words, the words, like all truthful words, work on us over time, like a steady, unrelenting stream slowly reshapes the banks of a river. The words do something to us even when we're not paying attention.
Mark Galli
You will go far in the Church.""I have no desire to go far. My only ambition is to be a good priest.""You will be that, of course. Nevertheless, you will go higher. And do you know why?”“Why?”“Because,” said Orselli, “you are not afraid of worldliness. I do not mean that you are worldly. Far from it. But you have a talent for being all things to all men.
Henry Morton Robinson
For his own unfathomable reasons, God chooses to disguise himself when he comes to this planet, and there have been few disguises better than the church.
Mark Galli
To live [in the church] at the beck and call of marketing logic is to live in slavery.
Mark Galli