#ow

There is strong shadow where there is much light. ↗

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

#enlightenment #shadow #enlightenment

To hold power has always meant to manipulate idiots and circumstances; and those circumstances and those idiots, tossed together, bring about those coincidences to which even the greatest men confess they owe most of their fame ↗

— Alfred de Vigny

#idiocy #power #fame

Young minds - young brains - need stories and ideas like the ones in those [censored and banned] books in order to grow. They need ideas that you disagree with. They need ideas that I disagree with. Or they'll never be able to figure out what ideas they believe in. ↗

— Lev Grossman

#censorship #growth #ideas #young-minds #censorship

We lived in the bowels of New York City. It was a struggle just to survive. This nice suburban kid hadn't had to do much of that before. ↗

— Peter Bergman

#bowels #city #had #hadn #just

Elections determine who is in power, but they do not determine how power is used. ↗

— Paul Collier

#elections #power #elections

What! Would I be turned back from doing a thing that I had determined to do, and that I knew to be right, by the airs and interference of such a person, or any person I may say? No, I have no idea of being so easily persuaded. When I have made up my mind, I have made it. ↗

— Jane Austen

#empowerment #independence #interference #judgment #persuasion

My face breaks into a huge smile and i start walking in Peeta's direction. Then, as if i can't stand it another second, I start running.He catches me and spins me around and then he slips-he still isn't entirely in command of his artificial leg-and we fall into the snow, me on top of him, and that's where we have our first kiss in months.It's full of fur and snowflakes and lipstick, but underneath all that, I can feel the steadiness that Peeta brings to everything. And I know I'm not alone.As badly as I've hurt him, he won't expose me in front of the cameras. Won't condemn me with a halfhearted kiss. He's still looking out for me. Just as he did in the arena. Somehow the thought makes me want to cry. Instead I pull him to his feet, tuck my glove through the crook of his arm, and merrily pull him on our way. ↗

— Suzanne Collins

#snow

Jon:'What are you doing up there? Why aren't you at the feast?' Tyrion: 'Too hot, too noisy, and I'd drunk too much wine', the dwarf told him. 'I learned long ago that it is considered rude to vomit on your brother. ↗

— George R.R. Martin

#alcohol #drunk #dwarf #feast #jon-snow

Anna is part of a generation that often seems frozen in place by their unreleting sense of irony. Virtually everything people believe in can be exposed as possessing laughable inconsistencies. And so they laugh. And stand still. ↗

— Scott Turow

#growing-up #time #thriller

I'm one of those people who never really joined the grown-ups. ↗

— Richard O'Brien

#i #joined #never #people #really