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| Link | Quote | Stars | Tags | Author |
| bf2d08b | throats in a dreadful silence. The infection will spread outward from that point. Old ladies will crack skulls with their deadly handbags. Cars will plunge down the crowded sidewalks. Drivers will be torn out of their cars and stomped. It will spread to all the huge cities of the world, and by dawn of the next day there will be a horrid silence of sprawled bodies and tumbled vehicles, gutted buildings and a few wisps of smoke. And through t.. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 984b477 | My friend Meyer, the economist, says that cretins are the only humans who can be absolutely certain of their own sanity. All the rest of us go rocketing along rickety rails over spavined bridges and along the edge of bottomless gorges. The man who believes himself free of any taint of madness is a damned liar. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 0d845a3 | The world is full of damp rocks, with some very strange creatures hiding under them. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 0c375d5 | I know just enough about myself to know I cannot settle for one of those simplifications which indignant people seize upon to make understandable a world too complex for their comprehension. Astrology, health food, flag waving, bible thumping, Zen, nudism, nihilism--all of these are grotesque simplifications which small dreary people adopt in the hope of thereby finding The Answer, because the very concept that maybe there is no answer, nev.. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 370cb3a | Then she would be that hostess in Houston and I would be that tanned one from Florida, a small memory of chlorinated pool water, fruit juice and gin, steak raw in the middle, and hearty rhythms in the draperied twilight of the tomb-cool motel cubicle, riding the grounded flesh of the jet-stream Valkyrie. A harmless pleasure. For harmless plastic people, scruff-proof, who can create the delusion of romance. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 82a0fb3 | Gian Gravina? 'A bore is a person who deprives you of solitude without providing you with company.' | John D. MacDonald | ||
| 020558a | The Only Thing in the World Worth a Damn is the Strange, Touching, Pathetic, Awesome Nobility of the Individual Human Spirit. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| be1d97f | Hascomb snatched an ancient weapon out of his glove compartment. Officers have smuggled them home from the last five wars. The Colt.45 automatic. | firearms | John D. MacDonald | |
| e346546 | He thought, as the locked truck slid and hit: Too much time staring at the pretty girl, Cherrik. Too much dreaming. Too old, Cherrik. Too damn old. | John D. MacDonald | ||
| ebc0441 | Having adventures," I replied. "Episode III of 'The Perils of Pamela.' " I told her the whole story. She gave vent to a deep sigh when I finished. "Why do these things always happen to you?" she demanded plaintively. "Why does no one gag me and bind me hand and foot?" "You wouldn't like it if they did," I assured her. "To tell you the truth, I'm not nearly so keen on having adventures myself as I was. A little of that sort of thing goes a l.. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 323b3b5 | But there are many fools in the world. One praises God for their existence and keeps out of their way. | Agatha Christie | ||
| a3f44d9 | I objected vigorously to this unsporting proposal. I recognized in it the disastrous effects of matrimony. How often have I not heard a perfectly intelligent female say, in the tone of one clinching an argument, "Edgar says--" And all the time you are perfectly aware that Edgar is a perfect fool. Suzanne, by reason of her married state, was yearning to lean upon some man or other." | Agatha Christie | ||
| 6d400cb | A man who has shot lions in large quantities has an unfair advantage over other men. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 619517c | I walked into Cartwright's and ordered two coffee ice cream sodas--to steady my nerves. A man, I suppose, would have had a stiff peg; but girls derive a lot of comfort from ice cream sodas. I applied myself to the end of the straw with gusto. The cool liquid went trickling down my throat in the most agreeable manner. I pushed the first glass aside empty. | Agatha Christie | ||
| a3e18a6 | Shall the dire day break when life finds us merely husband and wife with passion not so much denied as neatly laundered and put aside and the old joyous insistence trimmed to placid coexistence? Shall we sometime arise from bed with not a carnal thought in our head look at each other without surprise out of wide awake uncandid eyes touch and know no immediate urge where all mysteries converge? Speak for the sake of something to say and now .. | poem | Christy Brown | |
| 223a8fe | It was very like a dream. Like all dreamers, however, I could not let my dream alone. We poor humans are so anxious not to miss anything. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 0c8c226 | Several very suprising things have occurred. To begin with, I met Augustus Milray, the most perfect example of an old ass the present Government has produced. His manner oozed diplomatic secrecy as he drew me aside in the Club into a quiet corner. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 76c4e9e | dare say it is good for one now and again to realize what an idiot one can be! But nobody relishes the process. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 6305e67 | Men are so superior about their Latin," said Mrs. Blair. "But all the same I notice that when you ask them to translate inscriptions in old churches, they can never do it! They hem and haw, and get out of it somehow." | men translation | Agatha Christie | |
| fce4354 | We never seemed to have any money. His celebrity was not of the kind that brought in a cash return. Although he was a fellow of almost every important society and had rows of letters after his name, the general public scarcely knew of his existence, and his long-learned books, though adding signally to the sum total of human knowledge, had no attraction for the masses. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 9e51ff2 | I reflected a minute and then asked why he wanted to marry me. That seemed to fluster him a good deal, and he murmured that a wife was a great help to a general practitioner. The position seemed even more unromantic than before, and yet something in me urged towards its acceptance. Safety, that was what I was being offered. Safety--and a Comfortable Home. Thinking it over now, I believe I did the little man an injustice. He was honestly in .. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 033c422 | He was tall and broad-shouldered, wore a dark overcoat and black boots, a bowler hat. He had a dark-pointed beard and gold-rimmed eyeglasses." "Take away the overcoat, the beard and the eyeglasses, and there wouldn't be much to know him by," grumbled the inspector. "He could alter his appearance easily enough in five minutes if he wanted to--which he would do if he's the swell pickpocket you suggest." I had not intended to suggest anything .. | Agatha Christie | ||
| 4aeaf24 | Because of his face." "His face? But--" "Yes, I know what you're going to say. It's a sinister face. That's just it. No man with a face like that could be really sinister. It must be a colossal joke on the part of Nature." | Agatha Christie | ||
| 408f5aa | He's like all the rest of these people; they make inflammatory speeches of enormous length, solely for political purposes, and then wish they hadn't. | Agatha Christie | ||
| b32a976 | Um verdadeiro homem de fe deve acreditar que esta aqui para um proposito e que e um objeto de real interesse para um Ser Supremo; deve tambem fingir ter pelo menos uma nocao do que aquele Ser Supremo deseja. Eu proprio fui chamado de arrogante na juventude, e espero ganhar o titulo novamente; mas pretender conhecer os segredos do universo e seu criador - isso esta alem de minha presuncao. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| bcb0ea7 | The drops (polio vaccine) were designed,said these believers. Their intention and effect was genocidal. Nobody was to swallow them, or administer them to infants. Within months, polio was back... | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 2a254dc | Religion, then, partakes of equal elements of the canine and the feline. It exacts maximum servility and abjection, requiring you to regard yourself as conceived and born in sin and owing a duty to a stern creator. But in return, it places you at the center of the universe and assures you that you are the personal object of a heavenly plan. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 783bcaa | To begin with a summary of Paine's astonishing life and career is to commence with a sense of wonder that he was ever able to emerge at all. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 9ca4e11 | I have been taunted on various platforms recently for becoming a neo-conservative, and have been the object of some fascinating web-site and blog stuff, from the isolationist Right as well as from the peaceniks, who both argue in a semi-literate way that neo-conservativism is Trotskyism and 'permanent revolution' reborn. Sometimes, you have to comb an overt anti-Semitism out of this propaganda before you can even read it straight. And I can.. | blogosphere internet iraq-war isolationism neoconservatism peace-movement permanent-revolution politics propaganda right-wing-politics trotskyism us-non-interventionism war-on-terror | Christopher Hitchens | |
| b102d57 | Considering these limitations, it is quite astonishing how irreligious the Founders actually were. You might not easily guess, for example, who was the author of the following words: Oh! Lord! Do you think that a Protestant Popedom is annihilated in America? Do you recollect, or have you ever attended to the ecclesiastical Strifes in Maryland Pensilvania [sic], New York, and every part of New England? What a mercy it is that these People ca.. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 5bc4daf | Revolution from above, in some states and cases, is [...] often preferable to the status quo, or to no revolution at all. | iraq-war neoconservatism politics revolution | Christopher Hitchens | |
| a7c9b4d | The speakers use all accents of sincerity and sweetness, and they continuously praise virtue; but they never speak as if power would be theirs tomorrow and they would use it for virtuous action. And their audiences also do not seem to regard themselves as predestined to rule; they clap as if in defiance, and laugh at their enemies behind their hands, with the shrill laughter of children. They want to be right, not to do right. They feel no .. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 4b4a59f | I can remember when I was a bit of an ETA fan myself. It was in 1973, when a group of Basque militants assassinated Adm. Carrero Blanco. The admiral was a stone-faced secret police chief, personally groomed to be the successor to the decrepit Francisco Franco. His car blew up, killing only him and his chauffeur with a carefully planted charge, and not only was the world well rid of another fascist, but, more important, the whole scheme of e.. | 1973 assassination basque-people dictatorship eta fascism francisco-franco house-of-bourbon juan-carlos-i-of-spain luis-carrero-blanco spain terrorism | Christopher Hitchens | |
| 4588c18 | To the dumb question "Why me?" the cosmos barely bothers to return the reply: Why not?" | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 004f1c5 | The tone of the prayers replicates the silliness of the mandate, in that god is enjoined or thanked to do what he was going to do anyway. Thus the Jewish male begins each day by thanking god for not making him into a woman (or a Gentile), while the Jewish woman contents herself with thanking the almighty for creating her "as she is." Presumably the almighty is pleased to receive this tribute to his power and the approval of those he created.. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 9046868 | Montaigne: "Religion's surest foundation is the contempt for life." | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 31dd43d | To be charitable, one may admit that the religious often seem unaware of how insulting their main proposition actually is. Exchange views with a believer even for a short time, and let us make the assumption that this is a mild and decent believer who does not open the bidding by telling you that your unbelief will endanger your soul and condemn you to hell. It will not be long until you are politely asked how you can possibly know right fr.. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 22e14af | The atheist generally says (though the bold Dr. Victor Stenger goes a bit further) that the existence of a deity cannot be dis-proved. It can only be found to be entirely lacking in evidence or proof. The theist can opt to be a mere deist, and to say that the magnificence of the natural order strongly implies an ordering force. (This was the view taken, at least in public, by opponents of religion such as Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine.).. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 7d80e06 | Real rustics are not conscious of being picturesque, they do not construct bird sanctuaries, they are uninterested in any bird or animal that does not affect them directly ... The fact is that those who really have to deal with nature have no cause to be in love with it. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 2766c07 | believers fight each other over the correct interpretation and even kill members of their own faiths in battles over doctrine. Civilization has been immensely retarded by such arcane interfaith quarrels and could now be destroyed by their modern versions. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| be70b85 | For a fuller account of the revelations of the Moscow archives, and their detailed vindication of Orwell, see my Introduction to Orwell in Spain (Penguin, 2001). | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 3f4b618 | Only servility requires the realm of illusion. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| e769d39 | It is sometimes argued that disbelief in a fearful and tempting heavenly despotism makes life into something arid and tedious and cynical: a mere existence without any consolation or any awareness of the numinous or the transcendent. What nonsense this is. In the first place, it commits an obvious error. It seems to say that we ought not to believe that we are an evolved animal species with faulty components and a short lifespan for ourselv.. | Christopher Hitchens | ||
| 36b4bb4 | I have often wondered, that persons who make a boast of professing the Christian religion, namely, love, joy, peace, temperance, and charity to all men, should quarrel with such rancorous animosity, and display daily towards one another such bitter hatred, that this, rather than the virtues they claim, is the readiest criterion of their faith. | Christopher Hitchens |