|
60333f9
|
There is a legend about a bird which sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine. And, dying, it rises above its own agony to outcarol the lark and the nightingale. One superlative song, existence the price. But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles. For the best is only bought at the cost of great pain... Or so says the legend.
|
|
inspirational
legend
|
Colleen McCullough |
|
f6cc0f4
|
Exit, pursued by a bear.
|
|
surrealism
theater
legend
|
William Shakespeare |
|
7c45f29
|
Most have been forgotten. Most deserve to be forgotten. The heroes will always be remembered. The best. The best and the worst. And a few who were a bit of both.
|
|
heroes
loras-tyrell
jaime-lannister
villains
knights
legend
memory
stories
|
George R.R. Martin |
|
3c09521
|
Thinking and planning is one side of life; doing is another. A man cannot be doing all the time.
|
|
fantasy
crystal-cave
mary-stewart
merlin
tactics
king-arthur
planning
strategy
legend
|
Mary Stewart |
|
c9b62e1
|
"It was Stevenson, I think, who most notably that there are some places that simply demand a story should be told of them. ... After all, perhaps Stevenson had only half of the matter. It is true there are places which stir the mind to think that a story must be told about them. But there are also, I believe, places which have their story stored already, and want to tell this to us, through whatever powers they can; through our legends and lore, through our rumors, and our rites. By its whispering fields and its murmuring waters, by the wailing of its winds and the groaning of its stones, by what it chants in darkness and the songs it sings in light, each place must reach out to us, to tell us, tell us what it holds. ("The Axholme Toll")"
|
|
story
genius-loci
robert-louis-stevenson
location
psychogeography
place
horror
legend
|
Mark Valentine |
|
f7f1620
|
"It's horrible," she said. He looked at her in surprise. Horrible? Wasn't that odd? He hadn't thought that for years. For him the word "horror" had become obsolete. A surfeiting of terror made terror a cliche. To Robert Neville the situation merely existed as natural fact. It had no adjectives."
|
|
normalcy
terror
legend
|
Richard Matheson |
|
05f4ee0
|
There is a legend about a bird which sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine. And, dying, it rises above its own agony to outcarol the lark and the nightingale. One superlative song, existence the price. But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles. For the best is only bought at the cost of great pain... Or so says the legend
|
|
legend
|
Colleen McCullough |
|
9f0a8b4
|
"In 1908, in a wild and remote area of the North Caucasus, Leo Tolstoy, the greatest writer of the age, was the guest of a tribal chief "living far away from civilized life in the mountains." Gathering his family and neighbors, the chief asked Tolstoy to tell stories about the famous men of history. Tolstoy told how he entertained the eager crowd for hours with tales of Alexander, Caesar, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon. When he was winding to a close, the chief stood and said, "But you have not told us a syllable about the greatest general and greatest ruler of the world. We want to know something about him. He was a hero. He spoke with a voice of thunder; he laughed like the sunrise and his deeds were strong as the rock....His name was Lincoln and the country in which he lived is called America, which is so far away that if a youth should journey to reach it he would be an old man when he arrived. Tell us of that man." "I looked at them," Tolstoy recalled, "and saw their faces all aglow, while their eyes were burning. I saw that those rude barbarians were really interested in a man whose name and deeds had already become a legend." He told them everything he knew about Lincoln's "home life and youth...his habits, his influence upon the people and his physical strength." When he finished, they were so grateful for the story that they presented him with "a wonderful Arabian horse." The next morning, as Tolstoy prepared to leave, they asked if he could possibly acquire for them a picture of Lincoln. Thinking that he might find one at a friend's house in the neighboring town, Tolstoy asked one of the riders to accompany him. "I was successful in getting a large photograph from my friend," recalled Tolstoy. As he handed it to the rider, he noted that the man's hand trembled as he took it. "He gazed for several minutes silently, like one in a reverent prayer, his eyes filled with tears." Tolstoy went on to observe, "This little incident proves how largely the name of Lincoln is worshipped throughout the world and how legendary his personality has become. Now, why was Lincoln so great that he overshadows all other national heroes? He really was not a great general like Napoleon or Washington; he was not such a skilful statesman as Gladstone or Frederick the Great; but his supremacy expresses itself altogether in his peculiar moral power and in the greatness of his character. "Washington was a typical American. Napoleon was a typical Frenchman, but Lincoln was a humanitarian as broad as the world. He was bigger than his country--bigger than all the Presidents together. "We are still too near to his greatness," Tolstoy concluded, "but after a few centuries more our posterity will find him considerably bigger than we do. His genius is still too strong and too powerful for the common understanding, just as the sun is too hot when its light beams directly on us."
|
|
heroism
tolstoy
lincoln
legend
|
Doris Kearns Goodwin |
|
7fedebf
|
"In Pliny I read about the invention of clay modeling. A Sicyonian potter came to Corinth. There his daughter fell in love with a young man who had to make frequent long journeys away from the city. When he sat with her at home, she used to trace the outline of his shadow that a candle's light cast on the wall. Then, in his absence she worked over the profile, deepening, so that she might enjoy his face, and remember. One day the father slapped some potter's clay over the gouged plaster; when the clay hardened he removed it, baked it, and "showed it abroad" (63)." --
|
|
myth
story
folk-tale
fairy-tale
shadow
muslim
tale
legend
|
Annie Dillard |
|
eaeb2b4
|
That night she dreamed about the King again. She stood in a riverside meadow between greenwood and castle. Overhead the sun shone gilt in a sky like powdered lapis and struck golden sparks from the King's blood-red dragon banner.
|
|
fantasy
pendragon-s-heir
king-arthur
mythology
legend
|
Suzannah Rowntree |
|
15ffb76
|
"Paunch? I've a curved spine. Anyway, It's relaxed muscle." He looked down. "All right, it's a paunch. A few more days of this and it will go."
|
|
legend
|
David Gemmell |
|
5e4ec98
|
"We study," said Serbitar. "And we train, and we plant flowers and raise horses. Our time is well occupied, I can assure you." "No wonder you want to go away and die somewhere," said Rek with feeling."
|
|
legend
|
David Gemmell |
|
71471a6
|
Did it really happen as the legend said? Did they in truth dance here? Were they struck down in their defiance and turned to stone, to stand on this spot as the centuries passed? How fortunate they were! Sudden death was preferable to a lingering one. I thought of the seventh - the one who had been dragged to the hollow wall, the one who was shut in to die; and I was filled with a momentary melancholy.
|
|
virgin
legend
|
Victoria Holt |
|
e3ce6b8
|
The stories that grow up around a king are strong vines with a fierce grip.
|
|
leadership
repetitions
gossip
popularity
legend
|
Geraldine Brooks |