Quotes About Literature

we are literature- our lives, our hopes, our desires, our despairs, our passions, our strengths, our weaknesses. Stories express our longing not only to make a difference today but to see what is possible for tomorrow. Literature has been called a handbook for the art of being human. p. 93

Does everything always have to mean something else?" I ask before we get started. Who knew that literature was so tangled and complicated? "That is a wonderful lesson, Sang Ly. Remember it." "What was it again?" I ask, not certain to what she was referring. She repeats it for me. "In literature, everything means something.

I had read essays describing the horrors of genocide committed during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. I had lectured on Jewish literature detailing the atrocities carried out by Hitler. I had read the words in my head but never comprehended their depth in my heart—until I lived them. Only later would I realize that there are no words harsh enough, no paragraphs wide enough, no books deep enough to convey the weight of true human sorrow.

Our trials, our troubles, our demons, our angels—we reenact them because these stories explain our lives. Literature's lessons repeat because they echo from deeper places.

But literature is unique. To understand literature, you read it with your head, but you interpret it with your heart. The two are forced to work together—and, quite frankly, they often don't get along.

I know I'm not a wordsmith. And I don't write poetry. Sometimes I think I should, because it's really helpful. But I always wanted to write novels.

Books taught me how to think.

A la gente que nos gusta leer, el mundo real nos da lo mismo.

Melville brought to the task a sound knowledge of actual whaling, much curious learning in the literature of the subject, and, above all, an imagination which worked with great power upon the facts of his own experience.

IT is mere coincidence that Cooper was born in the year which produced The Power of Sympathy and that when he died Uncle Tom's Cabin was passing through its serial stage, and yet the limits of his life mark almost exactly the first great period of American fiction.

My books are shelved in different places, depending on the bookstore. Sometimes they can be found in the Mystery section, sometimes in the Humor department, and occasionally even in the Literature aisle, which is somewhat astounding.

multiple-murderer Jack Henry Abbott's book In The Belly of the Beast.

For River to discover himself in Rimbaud's life and Miller's prose was simultaneously self-aggrandizing and self-pitying. Tellingly, he was more interested in Miller's book than in Rimbaud's actual writing: he responded to Rimbaud not as a poet, but as a symbol.

Twenty-six letters and some punctuation marks and you have infinite words in infinite worlds. How is that not a miracle?

I continue reading, remembering why I used to love books. Because they show us, in so many words, and so many worlds, that we are not alone.

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I read the opening lines of the book, and it's like my own pages are coming unstuck. For so long, all I've felt is fear, and all this time, it was grief. I continue reading, remembering why I used to love books. Because they show us, in so many words, and so many worlds, that we are not alone. A miracle, in twenty-six letters.

Shakespeare trascends language

I'm sick of you all acting like I'm this English freak raining on your little math-science parade. Sung seems to think my contribution to this team is a little less than everyone else's." "Anyone can memorize book titles!" Sung shouted. "Oh, please.Like I care what you think? You don't even know the difference between Keats and Byron.

Ah, yes, I wrote the "Purple Cow"—I'm sorry, now, I wrote it!But I can tell you, anyhow,I'll kill you if you quote it.

I had a routine. I spent my mornings reading The Iron Fey series.

Whenever I think about the Enkidu story, I think Kipling really missed out on a much better ending for The Jungle Book.

The popular culture gives us books that offer entertainment but no ideas. High culture gives us books that offer ideas but no entertainment. The best books manage to do both.

Misunderstanding literary form can result in misunderstanding Scripture.

I became a reader - thank God I became a reader. I lived in a dream world because it was a hell of a lot better world.