Quote From a Book

{I've} learned through experience that kids don't think it's cute or even interesting--who can blame them?--that you happen to be a dinosaur. It frankly scores you no points at all.

~~from The River at Night: A Novel by Erica Ferencik
 

...{Someone} who stops and listens. If that's not the definition of friendship, it's close enough for now.

~~from I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger
 
What scares me is the notion we are all one rotten moment, one crushed hope or hollow stomach from stuffing someone blameless in a cage.

~~from I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger
 

...{W}hile we're staring up at the stars, we're distracted from the real work at our feet--making this place that nurtured us whole and healthy enough to sustain our children and grandchildren and their children after them, so that they can thank us, instead of cursing us for the ruins we leave to them.

~~from "Foreword" by Paolo Bacigalupi in Loosed Upon the World: The Saga Anthology of Climate Fiction, ed. by John Joseph Adams
 
"We need to live in the world like we're part of it. Like it matters to us. Because it does. And there's only so much we can burn and bury and waste before it starts to bite back. We're finding out how much that is. We've all got to learn to live a lot smaller, or else we're going to kill everything."

from "The Overstory" by Richard Powers
 
Good one, PD. And here's another...
"The metaphor of "Mother Earth" is no longer accurate or helpful. Human impact on nature is now so complete and irreversible that we're better off thinking of the planet as if it were our first child. It will be here after us. Its future is unknown and uncontrollable. We are forced to plan ahead for it. Our first obligation is to keep it from harm. We are learning from it how to be decent parents.”

From The Salt Summaries, by Stewart Brand
 
...[W]hen elites become desperate to hold on to power, [they] can do terrible, traumatic things, and...the deep psychology of modernity produces monsters the likes of which even the sleep of reason would struggle to generate.

~~from The Holocaust: An Unfinished History by Dan Stone
 
"I want you to feel, no matter how vicariously, a semblance of the feeling of a torn limb, a burnt patch of flesh; the crippling, numbing sensation of fear; the hopeless emptiness of fatigue. All these things are complementary to the province of war and friction, and they should be taught in classrooms along with the more heroic aspects of uniforms and flags, honor and patriotism."
~~from "To My Children", Dedication of his short story "First Squad, First Platoon" by Rod Serling
 
officerripley said:
"I want you to feel, no matter how vicariously, a semblance of the feeling of a torn limb, a burnt patch of flesh; the crippling, numbing sensation of fear; the hopeless emptiness of fatigue. All these things are complementary to the province of war and friction, and they should be taught in classrooms along with the more heroic aspects of uniforms and flags, honor and patriotism."
~~from "To My Children", Dedication of his short story "First Squad, First Platoon" by Rod Serling
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Wow! Powerful statement. I have often thought that when we are thinking about, or talking about suffering, that we always have a safe distance to do so. That is not really understanding the gravity of the pain and suffering. Unless these horrible events are actually happening to you, it is impossible to fully understand how totally crippling these tragedies are.
 
Paco Dennis said:
Wow! Powerful statement. I have often thought that when we are thinking about, or talking about suffering, that we always have a safe distance to do so. That is not really understanding the gravity of the pain and suffering. Unless these horrible events are actually happening to you, it is impossible to fully understand how totally crippling these tragedies are.
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That short story was recently discovered and Serling wrote it shortly after his experiences in World War 2. The dedication seems really timely to me in light of recent discussions about people being made to feel uncomfortable about historical facts.
 
officerripley said:
That short story was recently discovered and Serling wrote it shortly after his experiences in World War 2. The dedication seems really timely to me in light of recent discussions about people being made to feel uncomfortable about historical facts.
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We all want to be happy. It ruins our day really contemplating the troubles that abound. I tend to want to know, as best I can find, the reality behind these events. The news is a mess, and so is the independent media, so it is impossible to know for sure, ANYTHING. I feel like I am in a washing machine getting tumbled around. Occasionally it stops, only to have a gush of water hit me. :) Iguess in the new age of instant news (instant coffee ) yuk! we go along for the ride. like a roller coaster of truth. How do you navigate such a complex environment?
 
"High school just repeats itself again and again—college, job environment, family life, old folks home. High school is training for the world we live in."
~~from An Ambush of Widows by Jeff Abbott

I think I've already posted the next one here but since it reiterates the one above:

"The people in charge don’t have a great track record for solving problems. Most people are B and C students. There are a few brainiacs...but they’re generally not the ones in charge. Think high school. The jocks ran the show. Same thing now. Get a bunch of people together to solve a problem and it’s not the smartest guy who does the talking. It’s the loudest."
~~from This Plague of Days - Season One by Robert Chazz Chute
 
officerripley said:
"High school just repeats itself again and again—college, job environment, family life, old folks home. High school is training for the world we live in."
~~from An Ambush of Widows by Jeff Abbott

I think I've already posted the next one here but since it reiterates the one above:

"The people in charge don’t have a great track record for solving problems. Most people are B and C students. There are a few brainiacs...but they’re generally not the ones in charge. Think high school. The jocks ran the show. Same thing now. Get a bunch of people together to solve a problem and it’s not the smartest guy who does the talking. It’s the loudest."
~~from This Plague of Days - Season One by Robert Chazz Chute
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The world is full of guys like this...who’re so sure they know who deserves what that they’ll bend the world out of shape to make it so.

~~from A Different Kind of Gone by Catherine Ryan Hyde
 
...{S}lavery is a state of war: the coiled antithesis of the social contract...{S}lavery rests on violence, not consent. It cannot be established without doing violence to human nature. When slave owners say "that a man shall come into the world not a man," when philosophers like Aristotle say that some are born for slavery and others for dominion, they declare war on creation. Whatever theology one might cast over the conceit, the tension is never resolved. Slavery is the war that is never won.

~~from One Nation Under Guns: How Gun Culture Distorts our History and Threatens our Democracy by Dominic Erdozain
 
“…{T}he only way you get higher is if you step out of line. That’s the only way. Seriously. Unless you’re untalented. And then you should stay in line.”
~~from Burn Book: A Tech Love Story by Kara Swisher
 
"When the truth stands between a man and his next $100 million, the truth is always going to be escorted off the premises."

~~from Burn Book: A Tech Love Story by Kara Swisher
 
True wisdom is not found in books or intellectual understanding; it is a direct experience of reality beyond words and concepts.

~ The Way Of Zen
 
"..{T}he cheapest, most pleasurable way for a country of strangers to get to know each other and the rest of the world is through reading."
~~from “Introduction” by Sarah Vowell in The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2017, ed. by Sarah Vowell

AND

"When democracy is not burning well, poetry burns harder. Literature becomes dangerous, independent bookstores are bonfires that light the mind...In recent times, underground bookstores, writers, presses, have set flares for people's revolutions...{But} when autocracy or fascism descends...{on a country}, literature and bookstores and booksellers are the first to go."
~~from "Balancing Acts" by Louise Erdrich in the anthology It Occurs to Me that I am America: New Stories and Art, ed. by Jonathan Santlofer
 

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