Best 67 quotes in «classic literature quotes» category

Nə üçün insanın xoşbəxtliyini təşkil edən bir şey, həm də onun iztirablarının mənbəyi olmalıdır?

No child is an island. They come from families. They are the newest braids in that cord of humanity, and it is right and beautiful that they should know something of what their parents and grandparents value, while at the same time having access to the classic works of human imagination that we all own in common. Contemporary culture will take care of itself. It's lively and loud and most children's lives are full of it. When parents read long-beloved classics with them and share stories that convey what we want them to know about the world, we can help them discover powerful narratives and pictures they will never find on PBS Kids or Instagram.

No temas, mi amor; primero dejaré de existir antes de amarte.

Rome took all the vanity out of me, for after seeing the wonders there, I felt too insignificant to live, and gave up all my foolish hopes in despair." "Why should you, with so much energy and talent?" "That's just why, because talent isn't genius, and no amount of energy can make it so. I want to be great, or nothing. I won't be a common-place dauber, so I don't intend to try anymore.

She holstered her weapon, raising the hem of her skirts and stepping lightly around the dead bodies.

So does a whole world, with all of its greatness and littleness, lie in a twinkling star.

So ran the speech. Burdened and sick at heart, He feigned hope in his look, and inwardly Contained his anguish. […] Aeneas, more than any, secretly Mourned for them all

So, teaching him only that which she loved, not that which she had been taught, Janet read to Gibbie of Jesus, and talked to him of Jesus, until at length his whole soul was full of the Man, of His doings, of His words, of His thoughts, of His life. Almost before he knew, he was trying to fashion his life after that of the Master. Janet had no inclination to trouble her own head, or Gibbie's heart, with what men call the plan of salvation. It was enough to her to find that he followed her Master.

On the Day of Judgment , life and death are not determined by the world but by God's wisdom and law

Realize your youth while you have it. Don’t squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing

Ritengo di essere capace di leggere un poco nell'animo delle persone che mi circondano. Forse non è così. Nelle mie giornate migliori ho l'impressione di scrutare in fondo all'animo altrui, anche se non sono poi una gran testa. Siamo seduti in una stanza, qualche uomo, qualche donna e io. e mi sembra di vedere quel che accade dentro queste persone, e cosa pensano di me. Attribuisco un significato ad ogni cenno che appare nei loro occhi, a volte il sangue sale alle loro guance e le fa arrossire, altre volte fingono di guardare da un'altra parte e invece mi tengono d'occhio di nascosto. E io sto li e osservo tutto questo e nessuno sospetta che metto a nudo ogni anima.

,,Sa stvarima možeš postupati bez ljubavi: možeš obarati drveće, praviti opeke, kovati željezo bez ljubavi, ali s ljudima ne smiješ postupati bez ljubavi, isto kao što pčelama ne smiješ postupati bez opreznosti”.

That child of Hell had nothing human; nothing lived in him but fear and hatred.

That is a compliment which gives me no pleasure.

The author says one character's definition of a classic is any book he'd heard of before he was thirty.

The classics constitute an almost infallible process for awakening the soul to its full stature. In coming to know a classic, one has made a friend for life. It can be recalled to the mind and 'read' all over again in the imagination. And actually perusing the text anew provides a joy that increases with time. These marvelous works stand many rereadings without losing their force. In fact, they almost demand rereading, as a Beethoven symphony demands replaying. We never say of a music masterpiece, 'Oh I've heard that!' Instead, we hunger to hear it again to take in once more, with new feeling and insight, its long-familiar strains.

Say, you told me you thought Les Miserables was the greatest novel ever written. I think Vanity Fair is the greatest. Let's fight. - Joe Willard

The village was shutting its eyes. Candles and lamps were being put out everywhere: she could inwardly behold the extinguisher and the extended hand.

The sun will always rise, but we may never know

To Helen I saw thee once-once only-years ago; I must not say how many-but not many. It was a july midnight; and from out A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring, Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven, There fell a silvery-silken veil of light, With quietude, and sultriness, and slumber Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand Roses that grew in an enchanted garden, Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe- Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses That gave out, in return for the love-light Thier odorous souls in an ecstatic death- Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted by thee, by the poetry of thy prescence. Clad all in white, upon a violet bank I saw thee half reclining; while the moon Fell on the upturn'd faces of the roses And on thine own, upturn'd-alas, in sorrow! Was it not Fate that, on this july midnight- Was it not Fate (whose name is also sorrow) That bade me pause before that garden-gate, To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses? No footstep stirred; the hated world all slept, Save only thee and me. (Oh Heaven- oh, God! How my heart beats in coupling those two worlds!) Save only thee and me. I paused- I looked- And in an instant all things disappeared. (Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!) The pearly lustre of the moon went out; The mossy banks and the meandering paths, The happy flowers and the repining trees, Were seen no more: the very roses' odors Died in the arms of the adoring airs. All- all expired save thee- save less than thou: Save only the divine light in thine eyes- Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes. I saw but them- they were the world to me. I saw but them- saw only them for hours- Saw only them until the moon went down. What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwritten Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres! How dark a woe! yet how sublime a hope! How silently serene a sea of pride! How daring an ambition!yet how deep- How fathomless a capacity for love! But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight, Into western couch of thunder-cloud; And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained. They would not go- they never yet have gone. Lighting my lonely pathway home that night, They have not left me (as my hopes have) since. They follow me- they lead me through the years. They are my ministers- yet I thier slave Thier office is to illumine and enkindle- My duty, to be saved by thier bright light, And purified in thier electric fire, And sanctified in thier Elysian fire. They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope), And are far up in heaven- the stars I kneel to In the sad, silent watches of my night; While even in the meridian glare of day I see them still- two sweetly scintillant Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!

To write timelessly about the here and now, a writer must approach the present indirectly. The story has to be about more than it at first seems. Shakespeare used the historical sources of his plays as a scaffolding on which to construct detailed portraits of his own age. The interstices between the secondhand historical plots and Shakespeare’s startlingly original insights into Elizabethan England are what allow his work to speak to us today. Reading Shakespeare, we know what it is like, in any age, to be alive. So it is with Moby-Dick, a novel about a whaling voyage to the Pacific that is also about America racing hell-bent toward the Civil War and so much more. Contained in the pages of Moby-Dick is nothing less than the genetic code of America: all the promises, problems, conflicts, and ideals that contributed to the outbreak of a revolution in 1775 as well as a civil war in 1861 and continue to drive this country’s ever-contentious march into the future. This means that whenever a new crisis grips this country, Moby-Dick becomes newly important. It is why subsequent generations have seen Ahab as Hitler during World War II or as a profit-crazed deep-drilling oil company in 2010 or as a power-crazed Middle Eastern dictator in 2011.

What a fool I was not to tear my heart out on the day when I resolved to avenge myself!

Why is it necessary to everyone to read the classics? Shouldn't only specialists spend their time on these texts, with other people devoting their efforts to particular interests of their own? Actually, it is precisely because these works are intended for *all* that they have become classics. They have been tried and tested and deemed valuable for the general culture --- the way in which people live their lives. They have been found to enhance and elevate the consciousness of all sorts and conditions of people who study them, to lift their readers out of narrowness or provincialism into a wider vision of humanity. Further, they guard the truths of the human heart from the faddish half-truths of the day by straightening the mind and imagination and enabling their readers to judge for themselves. In a word, they lead those who will follow into a perception of the fullness and complexity of reality.

yapacak hiçbir şey yoktu,duyacak hiçbir şey yoktu,görecek hiçbir şey yoktu,her yerde ve sürekli olarak insanın çevresinde hiçlik, zamandan ve mekandan mutlak anlamda yoksun bir boşluk vardı.insan bir aşağı bir yukarı gidip geliyordu ve onunla birlikte düşünceler de bir aşağı bir yukarı,bir aşağı bir yukarı gidip geliyordu,sürekli gidip geliyordu.fakat sonuçta düşüncelerin de,ne herhangi bir özden yoksunmuş gibi görünürlerse görünsünler, bir destek noktasına ihtiyaçları vardır,aksi takdirde dönmeye ve anlamsız bir biçimde kendi etrflarında çember çizmeye başlarlar;onlar da hiçliğe dayanamazlar.insan bir şey bekliyordu,sabahtan akşama kadar bekliyordu ve hiçbir şey olmuyordu. insan tekrar tekrar bekliyordu. hiçbir şey olmuyordu. insan bekliyor, bekliyor, bekliyordu, düşünüyor, düşünüyordu, şakakları ağrımaya başlayana kadar düşünüyordu. hiçbir şey olmuyordu. insan yalnız kalıyordu. yalnız. yalnız.

You’ll have to do better than that chaps, if you want to kill me!

Abraham, like his parents, seemed to have been limed and caught by the ensnaring inn.

A classic is a successful book that has survived the reaction of the next period or generation. Then it's safe, like a style in architecture or furniture. It's acquired a picturesque dignity to take the place of its fashion....

. . . a statement that is repugnant to one's beliefs can be as true as one that is pleasurable.

Tenía la creencia de que el amor habría de llegar de golpe, entre grandes destellos y fulgores, a modo de huracán de los cielos que cae sobre la vida, la trastorna, arrasa la voluntad como hoja al viento y arrastra el corazón hasta hundirlo en los abismos.

As they walked, it seemed almost every building had some similar contrivance as decoration, adorning the street in a cacophony of clangs, bangs and whirs. The street’s surroundings danced with steam and smoke, the scent of oil and grease its perfume.

A way a lone a last a loved a long the—

...because there's a secret order. The books, you can't place them random. The other day I put Cervantes next to Tolstoj. And I thought, if close to Anna Karenina we have Don Quixote, sure the latter will do his best to save her.

Ayaklarını indirdi, kolunun üzerine yan yattı ve birden kendine acımaya başladı. Gerasim'in bitişik odaya geçmesini bekledi, sonra kendini bıraktı ve çocuklar gibi ağlamaya başladı. Umarsızlığına, korkunç yalnızlığına, insanların acımasızlığına, Tanrı'nın acımasızlığına, Tanrı'nın yokluğuna ağlıyordu.

Children's books can break [the] silence. Reading the un-bowdlerized classics of children's literature can help young people understand that racism is not anomalous. It is embedded in the culture, and defended by cultural gatekeepers.

Bizdə ilk təəssürata meyil olduqca güclüdür, buna görə də doğruya oxşamayan nə varsa hamısına inanmağa hazırıq, bu təəssürat bizdə dərhal kök salıb qalır, vay o adamın halına ki, bunu çıxarıb atmağa və kökündən yox eləməyə təşəbbüs edə!

Bir şey də aydındır: Dünyada insanı sevdirən, yalnız məhəbbətin gücüdür.

Dantes remained confused and silent by this explanation of the thoughts which had unconsciously been working in his mind, or rather soul; for there are two distinct sorts of ideas, those that proceed from the head and those from the heart.

Classics aren't books that are read for pleasure. Classics are books that are imposed on unwilling students, books that are subjected to analyses of "levels of significance" and other blatt, books that are dead.

Das Leben ist zu kurz, um schlechten Wein zu trinken. - Quoted from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Don't let politeness interelfere with truth

Dite all’Angelo che veglierà sulla vostra vita, Morrel, di pregare qualche volta per un uomo che, simile a Satana, per un momento si è creduto simile a Dio e ha riconosciuto, con tutta l’umiltà di un cristiano, che nelle mani di Dio soltanto sta il supremo potere e la infinita sapienza

Don't let politeness interfere with truth

Dear Jim." The writing grew suddenly blurred and misty. And she had lost him again--had lost him again! At the sight of the familiar childish nickname all the hopelessness of her bereavement came over her afresh, and she put out her hands in blind desperation, as though the weight of the earth-clods that lay above him were pressing on her heart. Presently she took up the paper again and went on reading: "I am to be shot at sunrise to-morrow. So if I am to keep at all my promise to tell you everything, I must keep it now. But, after all, there is not much need of explanations between you and me. We always understood each other without many words, even when we were little things. "And so, you see, my dear, you had no need to break your heart over that old story of the blow. It was a hard hit, of course; but I have had plenty of others as hard, and yet I have managed to get over them,--even to pay back a few of them,--and here I am still, like the mackerel in our nursery-book (I forget its name), 'Alive and kicking, oh!' This is my last kick, though; and then, tomorrow morning, and--'Finita la Commedia!' You and I will translate that: 'The variety show is over'; and will give thanks to the gods that they have had, at least, so much mercy on us. It is not much, but it is something; and for this and all other blessings may we be truly thankful! "About that same tomorrow morning, I want both you and Martini to understand clearly that I am quite happy and satisfied, and could ask no better thing of Fate. Tell that to Martini as a message from me; he is a good fellow and a good comrade, and he will understand. You see, dear, I know that the stick-in-the-mud people are doing us a good turn and themselves a bad one by going back to secret trials and executions so soon, and I know that if you who are left stand together steadily and hit hard, you will see great things. As for me, I shall go out into the courtyard with as light a heart as any child starting home for the holidays. I have done my share of the work, and this death-sentence is the proof that I have done it thoroughly. They kill me because they are afraid of me; and what more can any man's heart desire? "It desires just one thing more, though. A man who is going to die has a right to a personal fancy, and mine is that you should see why I have always been such a sulky brute to you, and so slow to forget old scores. Of course, though, you understand why, and I tell you only for the pleasure of writing the words. I loved you, Gemma, when you were an ugly little girl in a gingham frock, with a scratchy tucker and your hair in a pig-tail down your back; and I love you still. Do you remember that day when I kissed your hand, and when you so piteously begged me 'never to do that again'? It was a scoundrelly trick to play, I know; but you must forgive that; and now I kiss the paper where I have written your name. So I have kissed you twice, and both times without your consent. "That is all. Good-bye, my dear" Then am I A happy fly, If I live Or if I die

Era caduto dal suo modesto trono di re pastore fin giù, negli abissi melmosi di Siddim; ma gli erano rimaste una calma dignitosa che non aveva mai conosciuto prima e quell'indifferenza al destino che, benché spesso faccia dell'uomo un violento, diversamente è la base della sua sublimazione. Insomma, la sua caduta in basso era diventata un'ascesa, la perdita un guadagno.

I am he whom you sold and dishonored — I am he whose betrothed you prostituted — I am he upon whom you trampled that you might raise yourself to fortune — I am he whose father you condemned to die of hunger — I am he whom you also condemned to starvation, and who yet forgives you, because he hopes to be forgiven - I am Edmund Dantes!

If we have lagged behind, dear brother, let us not be ashamed of it! So much is thrown away and lost on the road of the so called "times", that it is all right if there is someone to pick it up. I always fancy that the day will come when people will suddenly discover that they have lost what is behind them, and have nothing to gain from what is in front of them. That a moment may arise in their lives when they put the headlines and best-sellers aside and remember the verse of a hymn which they learned as children. That they will switch off the wireless for a while, and embrace the vast silence which ensues.

Ignoring somebody’s mistakes in life from a powerful position makes you a saint, but the same act (whose intention does not matter), if carried out from a weak position, will make you a coward or helpless.

I had realized that it was not the courage and generosity of the dead which had brought about this chaos of disaster, but the failure of courage and generosity on the part of the survivors… Perhaps, after all, the best that we who were left could do was to refuse to forget, and to teach our successors what we remembered, in the hope that they, when their own day came, would have more power to change the state of the world than this bankrupt, shattered nation. If only, somehow, the nobility which in us had been turned toward destruction could be used in them for creation, if the courage which we had dedicated to war could be employed, by them, on behalf of peace, then the future might indeed see the redemption of man instead of his further descent into chaos.

In those days the soul's amorous fancies were clothed simply and plainly, exactly as they were conceived, without any search for artificial elaborations to enhance them. Nor had fraud, deceit, or malice mingled with truth and sincerity. Justice pursued her own proper purposes, undisturbed and unassailed by favour and interest, which so impair, restrain, and pervert her today. The law did not then depend on the judge's nice interpretations, for there were none to judge or to be judged. Maiden modesty roamed, as I have said, wherever she would, single and solitary, without fear of harm from strangers' licence or lascivious assault, and if she was undone it was of her own will and desire.

I said, "Don't do nothing of the kind; it's one of the most jackass ideas I ever struck;