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Read through the most famous quotes by topic #literature
I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed. And on the pedestal these words appear: 'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. ↗
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity ↗
How keen everyone is to make this world their home forgetting its impermanence It's like trying to see and name constellations in a fireworks display. ↗
Literature is the most noble of professions. In fact, it is about the only one fit for a man. For my own part, there is no seducing me from the path. I shall be a litterateur, at least, all my life; nor would I abandon the hopes which still lead me on for all the gold in California.” EDGAR ALLAN POE TO FREDERICK WILLIAM THOMAS FEBRUARY 14, 1849 ↗
When you've got a thing to say, Say it! Don't take half a day. When your tale's got little in it Crowd the whole thing in a minute! Life is short--a fleeting vapor-- Don't you fill the whole blamed paper With a tale which, at a pinch, Could be cornered in an inch! Boil her down until she simmers, Polish her until she glimmers. ↗
Personally, I am a hedonistic reader; I have never read a book merely because it was ancient. I read books for the aesthetic emotions they offer me, and I ignore the commentaries and criticism. ↗
Is there anything more plausible than a second hand? And yet it takes only the smallest pleasure or pain to teach us time's malleability. Some emotions speed it up, others slow it down; occasionally, it seems to go missing--until the eventual point when it really does go missing, never to return. ↗
#history #life #literature #time #life
