Quotes About Observation

The world has locusts, and the world has grasshoppers. I was up to my knees in the world

Everywhere, things snagged me. The visible world turned me curious to books; the books propelled me reeling back to the world.

People whose parents were perhaps illiterate read strangers' eyes—you can watch them read yours—and learn what they need to know. It does not take long. They understand that grand coincidence brings us together, upright and within earshot, in this flickering generation of human life on this durable planet—common language or not, sale or no sale—and therefore to mark the occasion we might as well have a little cigarette.

I once spent a full three minutes looking at a bullfrog that was so unexpectedly large I couldn't see it even though a dozen enthusiastic campers were shouting directions. Finally I asked, What color am I looking for? and a fellow said, Green. When at last I picked out the frog, I saw what painters are up against: the thing wasn't green at all, but the color of wet hickory bark. The lover can see, and the knowledgeable.

nature is very much a now-you-see-it, now-you-don't affair. A fish flashes, then dissolves in the water before my eyes like so much salt. Deer apparently ascend bodily into heaven; the brightest oriole fades into leaves.

If you can't see the forest for the trees, then look at the trees; when you've looked at enough trees, you've seen a forest, you've got it.

The camera makes you forget you're there. It's not like you are hiding but you forget, you are just looking so much.

Things happen in front of you. That's perhaps the most wonderful and mysterious aspect of photography. It seemed like you just had to decide when and where to aim the camera. The process was linear and it never stopped. That's still true, although I've traded in my need for always taking pictures. I can't let them go by sometimes now and just be there.

We observe few objects really closely. As we walk on the earth, we observe the external events at two or three arms' lengths. If we ride a horse or drive in an automobile, we are further separated from the immediate surround. We see and photograph scenery; our vast world is inadequately described as the landscape. The most intimate object perceived daily is usually the printed page. The small and commonplace are rarely explored.

Look at your waiter's face. He knows. It's another reason to be polite to your waiter: he could save your life with a raised eyebrow or a sigh.

He wears the bemused expression of a guy who knows how bad it can get, who's always looking and waiting for the other shoe to drop.

The next folks to arrive will be the cat-food people. Think about that when you see the 'Discount Sushi' sign.

Live the dream for a bit. But keep your eyes open. And be careful. As you'll see, many visitors came to Tangier for a short vacation and remained for life. It's that kind of place.

What's this for?' I said. And this veck replied, interrupting his like song an instant, that it was to keep my gulliver still and make me look at the screen. 'But,' I said, 'I want to look at the screen. I've been brought here to viddy films and viddy films I shall.

It's funny how the colours of the like real world only seem real real when you viddy them on a screen

It's funny how the colours of the like real world only seem really real when you viddy them on the screen.

It's funny how the colours of the like real world only seem really real when you viddy them on the screen.

It's funny how the colors of the real world only seem really real when you watch them on a screen." ? Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange

It's funny how the colours of the like real world only seem really real when you viddy them on a screen.

As a child you are in some ways more acutely aware of what people feel about one another than you are when childhood has come to an end.

You know a fact that strikes one very forcibly as one grows older is that some people are intelligent and some are stupid.

This person was standing under Lavery's portrait of Lady Walpole-Wilson, painted at the time of her marriage, in a white dress and blue sash, a picture he was examining with the air of one trying to fill in the seconds before introductions begin to take place, rather than on account of a deep interest in art.

Even the formal measure of the Seasons seemed suspended in the wintry silence.

Has any writer ever told the truth about women?' he had asked. . . . 'Possibly. Nor about men either, if it comes to that.