Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

Day 11: Favorite quote from a book.

Mine is "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."

When I was younger, I had a computer program to help with typing, and I spent hours typing this passage, racing against a cartoon jester who would hop on the letters faster and faster! Haha! I used to have the entire first passage memorized from typing it over and over again.

I had to go away and think for a long time about this, but probably:

"... there is no higher life form than a Librarian"

"For you, a thousand times over". -- Amir's cleansing and healing words to Hassan's son, Sohrab in "Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini. Those words brought tears to my eyes and heart.

Revisiting this one: am I allowed a play as a book? If so it would have to be John of Gaunt's wonderful speech from Richard II.

This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise;
This fortress, built by nature for herself,
Against infection, and the hand of war;
This happy breed of men, this little world;
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands;
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England

'It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a fortune must be in want of a wife'

I have liked this since the day I read it. I wish politicians would read it.


If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind?”
― Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

Didn't realize there were 2 entries for Day 11:

"Writing in a diary is a really strange experience for someone like me. Not only because I've never written anything before, but also because it seems to me that later on neither I nor anyone else will be interested n the musings of a thirteen-year-old schoolgirl." Anne Frank

It's eerie reading that sentence in her diary...if only she knew how much of an impact she has made on the world after her passing.

Rachel wrote: "Didn't realize there were 2 entries for Day 11:..."

Yes, two Days Eleven *grin*

"Evil indeed is the man who has not one woman to mourn him." The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle

I can never remember quotes, give me dates in history or NHL statistics, those are easier. I think my "favourite" quotes are from Finnish classics because I have heard of them many times before even reading the books.

I won't bother to write them because hardly anyone will understand but The Unknown Soldier has many. One from The Egyptian talks about how everything, especially people, stay the same through times, but I can't remember that accurately...

One example from The Unknown Soldier: "Asialliset hommat suoritetaan, muuten ollaan kuin Ellun kanat." They even held a translation contest for that. http://www.iltasanomat.fi/viihde/art-...

1. Literary translation, the most accurete
”When duty calls, we react, when bunk calls, we relax.” – Petri Linja-Aho

2. Humour, the funniest
”We work our way to Tipperary. Offroad we thirst for Bloody Mary.” – Jouni Hynynen

3. The best translation by a school class
”We take care of our duties and the rest of the time we are as lazy as Garfield.” – Pihlajisto school, class 5b, teacher Jaana-Maija Pohjala.

And that quote was by an officer... I wonder has there even been some "Ellu" who had less than formal chicken...

"A good story is always more dazzling than a broken piece of truth." From The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.

Me Micawber in Dickens's David Copperfield:
"Annual income twenty pounds. Annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and sixpence. Result: happiness. Annual income twenty pounds. Annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six. Result: misery.

I'm sorry if this is not precisely right as I'm doing it from memory. I shall check it now!

Ok, checked it out. Just slight changes:

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.

He who waits not for chance conquers fate.

From a Clive Cussler, Dirk Pitt novel.....though I can't remember precisely which one.

Joseph wrote: "He who waits not for chance conquers fate.

From a Clive Cussler, Dirk Pitt novel.....though I can't remember precisely which one."

I remember this quote. I can't place the book it was from and don't know it was from a Dirk Pitt or Juan Cabrillo story.

"All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us." (Lord of the Rings)

Really need to read this again (for the 4th time) in near future.

I love that quotation, Guadalupe.

Well I don't remember anything really specific other than
"Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn."
I do love this a lot.

So many. This one is right up there though:
“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” To Kill a Mockingbird

Trisha wrote: "Day 11: Favorite quote from a book.

Mine is "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..."

When I was younger, I had a computer program to help with typing, and I spent hours typing thi..."
Mine is- "It's a far, far better thing that I do now...."

"If reality is not what you want it to be, change it." - Hannu Rajaniemi, The Fractal Prince.

Too many to count. I find at least one sentence per book that really speaks to me. :)

A World is supported by four things…the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous and the valor of the brave. But all of these are as nothing…without a ruler who knows the art of ruling. Narrative from Dune

I have to, I'm sorry in advance, but I have to...point out it's a quotation, not a quote (quote: verb; quotation: noun).

Yes, I know that owing to common misuse, there has been a semantic change, and that both the M-W, and Oxford dictionaries recognize alternate use of quote as a noun. I REJECT this change.

It's me, it isn't you...but it would still make my day if someone would change this to "favorite quotation from a book". :)

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.” — Jane Austen, "Northanger Abbey"

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

That is an excellent one, Wreade.

I'm a collector of quotations (thank you Joseph!), and this one might be my all-time favorite.

“The best thing for being sad," replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, "is to learn something. That's the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”
― T.H. White, The Once and Future King

Here's one that may speak to many other readers too:

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.”
― Jorge Luis Borges

Yes Cynda that does speak to me.

Joseph wrote: "It's me, it isn't you...but it would still make my day if someone would change this to "favorite quotation from a book"

So happy to accomodate, Joseph. It is changed.

“There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own.”
― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

“No fiction is worth reading except for entertainment. If it entertains and is clean, it is good literature, or its kind. If it forms the habit of reading, in people who might not read otherwise, it is the best literature.”
― Edgar Rice Burroughs

Sara wrote: "Joseph wrote: "It's me, it isn't you...but it would still make my day if someone would change this to "favorite quotation from a book"

So happy to accomodate, Joseph. It is changed."

YAY! You made my day Sara! (sorry I didn't catch it sooner)