#ect

Indeed, "brute force" solutions are often characteristic of advanced cultures, not primitive ones. The Romans and their predecessors spent a long time figuring out how to build arches... and virtually all our buildings today use post-and-lintel construction, precisely what the arch was devised to replace. We have better materials and more money, and given that, arches are usually not worth the extra complexity. ↗

— Henry Spencer

#brute-force #complexity #elegance #engineering #architecture

We need – more urgently than architectural utopias, ingenious traffic disposal systems, or ecological programmes – to comprehend the nature of citizenship, to make serious imaginative assessment of that special relationship between the self and the city; its unique plasticity, its privacy and freedom. ↗

— Jonathan Raban

#citizenship #inspirational #sustainability #architecture

I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain. ↗

— John Adams

#politics #architecture

[The building] had been designed by an architect, so it bore little resemblance to any normal structure. ↗

— Gary Corby

#humor #architecture

She's kind of a walking poem, she's this perfect beauty...but at the same time very deep, very smart. ↗

— Johnny Depp

#beauty #deep #perfect #poem #smart

We must remember that we cannot change others, we can only change ourselves. ↗

— Bryant McGill

#personal-transformation #respect #change

I'm sorry," Leo murmured and then seemed to look through Martin for a few seconds before he returned his gaze to him. "Although if it's any comfort - and please don't take this the wrong way, because I speak from my own perspective, which I understand often places me far outside of the norm - I sometimes like to think that death, at least in the case of those we truly love, allows us to appreciate what they have done for us in ways that are not possible when we're all here, constantly changing and fixated on how to get from one day to the next. Death offers us the chance to reflect on who they were, which of course is a way to understand ourselves. As painful as it can be to see them go - and I don't mean to diminish the sense of loss or grief we all feel - there is also no greater gift. ↗

— Matthew Gallaway

#introspection #change

Morris Weissman [on the phone, discussing casting for his movie]: "What about Claudette Colbert? She's British, isn't she? She sounds British. Is she, like, affected or is she British? ↗

— Julian Fellowes

#actors #affectations #british #claudette-colbert #clichés

Yeah. She'd manipulated the second most powerful vampire in town into taking her side against a psycho bitch-queen sorority girl. She'd talked rationally about putting people's brains into computers. This was a normal day. No wonder she was screwed up. ↗

— Rachel Caine

#morganville-vampires #normal #normalcy #perspective #rachel-caine

I’d once again see that bob of blonde hair back on my pillow, that pink hot smile beaming toward me as I heroically win her heart in some kind of Count of Monte Cristo or Great Gatsby-esque gesture… you know minus the long imprisonment or swimming pool death! ↗

— Tom Conrad

#apocalypse #end-of-the-world #gatsby #heroes #heroic