#pen

The purchases of courteous Dr. Fell over his months in Florence would not have totaled more than one hundred lire, but the fragrances and essences were chosen and combined with a sensibility startling and gratifying to these scent merchants, who live by the nose. It was to preserve this pleasure that Dr. Lecter had not altered his own nose with rhinoplasty other than external collagen injections. For him the air was painted with scents as distinct and vivid as colors, and he could layer and feather them as though painting wet-on-wet. Here there was nothing of jail. Here the air was music. Here were pale tears of frankincense awaiting extraction, yellow bergamot, sandalwood, cinnamon and mimosa in concert, over the sustaining ground notes of genuine ambergris, civet, castor from the beaver, and essence of the musk deer. Dr. Lecter sometimes entertained the illusion that he could smell with his hands, his arms and cheeks, that odor suffused him. That he could smell with his face and his heart. ↗

— Thomas Harris Hannibal

#suspence-romance #thriller #music

What has been happening the last four years in City Hall is that they have been closing recreation centers, closing libraries. We have not looked after our children in City Hall. ↗

— Carl Stokes

#been #centers #children #city #city hall

To be evenminded is the greatest virtue. Wisdom is to speak the truth and act in keeping with its nature. ↗

— Heraclitus

#open-mindedness #philosophy #wisdom #nature

People who want to understand democracy should spend less time in the library with Aristotle and more time on the buses and in the subway. ↗

— Simeon Strunsky

#buses #democracy #less #library #more

I'll walk where my own nature would be leading. It vexes me to choose another guide. ↗

— Charlotte Brontë

#self-reliance #nature

...You're not suited for this Merripen. You can't hold your liquor worth a damn. And unlike people such as me, who become quite amicable when they drink, you turn into a vile-tempered troll." Leo paused considering how best to provoke him. "Liquor brings out one's true inner nature, they say. ↗

— Lisa Kleypas

#merripen #nature

Bjarne Møller, my former boss, says people like me always choose the line of most resistance. It's in what he calls our 'accursed nature'. That's why we always end up on our own. I don't know. I like being alone. Perhaps I have grown to like my self-image of being a loner, too....I think you have to find something about yourself that you like in order to survive. Some people say being alone is unsociable and selfish. But you're independent and you don't drag others down with you, if that's the way you're heading. Many people are afraid of being alone. But it made me feel strong, free and invulnerable. ↗

— Jo Nesbø

#loner #self-image #nature

Nul ne peut voir par-dessus soi, écrit Schopenhauer pour faire comprendre l'impossibilité d'un échange d'idées entre deux individus d'un niveau intellectuel trop différent. ↗

— Michel Houellebecq

#intelligence #schopenhauer #communication

Vaguely conscious of that great suspense in which we live, we find our escape from its sterile, annihilating reality in many dreams, in religion, passion, art. ↗

— Arthur Symons

#dreams #escape #religion #suspense #throbbing-gristle

The identity that we ascribe to things is only a fictitious one, established by the mind, not a peculiar nature belonging to what we’re talking about. ↗

— David Hume

#nature