"She broke free of the chords and released her fingers into intricacy, tumbling into what she had held back, the jazz detail that split open notes and angles from the chestnut of melody."
Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient
#michaelondaatje #theenglishpatient
Artwork by Debra Hurd
"Those who live by the sea can hardly form a single thought of which the sea would not be part."
Der Versucher (The Spell), Hermann Broch
#hermannbroch
Sculpture by Louise Durham
"She asked me what made me do such a thing. That is an awkward question because I often can't tell what makes me do things. Sometimes I do them just to find out what I feel like doing them. And sometimes I do them because I want to have some exciting things to tell my grandchildren."
Emily of New Moon, L.M. Montgomery
Finn
https://thebookkeepersite.wordpress.com/2018/10/02/new/
#lmmontgomery #emilyofnewmoon
Even big collections of ordinary books distort space and time, as can readily be proved by anyone who has been around a really old fashioned second hand bookshop, one of those that has more staircases than storeys and those rows of shelves that end in little doors that are surely too small for a full sized human to enter.
Terry Pratchett, Stephen Briggs
The New Discworld Companion
#terrypratchett
"If there be light, then there is darkness; if cold, heat; if height, depth; if solid, fluid; if hard, soft; if rough, smooth; if calm, tempest; if prosperity, adversary; if life, death."
Pythagoras, The Golden Verses of Pythagoras
#pythagoras
There are a dozen views about everything until you know the answer. Then there's never more than one.
C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength
#cslewis #thathideousstrength #TheBookKeeper
"Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does."
Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad
Sculpture by Marie Paule Deville Chabrolle
#margaretatwood #thepenelopiad #reading #wisdom #greatbooks
"After all, colour in itself has no colour - it's simply a construction of the mind: a sensation, like the Humming Chorus from Madam Butterfly and the smell of honeysuckle."
Jasper Fforde, Shades of Grey
Glass sculpture by Glass Baron
#reading #TheBookKeeper #jasperfforde #shadesofgrey
"Books are mirrors: you only see in them what you already have inside you."
Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Shadow of the Wind
#reading #theshadowofthewind #carlosruizzafon
"...a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge."
George R R Martin, A Game of Thrones
#georgerrmartin #agameofthrones #reading #books
Whatever the imagination seizes as Beauty must be truth - whether it existed before or not.
John Keats
Sculpture by Bruce Nauman
#johnkeats #poetry
"Air, I should explain, becomes wind when it is agitated."
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things
Paper Mache sculpture by Tanaka Kazuhiko
#lucretius #TheBookKeeper #sculpture #classics #whyweread #philosophy
I like reading my own writing. It seems to fit me closer than it did before.
Virginia Woolf, A Writer's Diary
#virginiawoolf #awritersdiary #reading #books #classics #literature #writing
The rain to the wind said,
You push and I'll pelt.
They so smote the garden bed
That the flowers actually knelt,
And lay lodged - though not dead.
I know how the flowers felt.
Robert Frost
Sculpture "Rain" by Nazar Bilyk
#robertfrost
"There was a single blue line of crayon drawn across every wall in the house. What does it mean? I asked. A pirate needs the sight of the sea, he said, and then he pulled his eye patch down and turned and sailed away."
Brian Andreas, Story People
#storypeople brianandreas
Children know perfectly well that unicorns aren't real, but they also know that books about unicorns, if they are good books, are true books."
Ursula Le Guin, The Language of the Night
#ursulaleguin #thelanguageofthenight #reading #books #libraries #bibliophile
Photography by John Wilhelm
"So fine was the morning except for a streak of wind here and there that the sea and sky looked all one fabric, as if sails were stuck high up in the sky, or the clouds had dropped down into the sea."
Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse
#reading #books #classics #virginiawoolf #tothelighthouse
She had blue skin
And so did he.
He kept it hid
And so did she.
They searched for blue
Their whole lives through,
They passed right by-
And never knew.
Shel Silverstein, Everything on It
#shelsilverstein
"A man that flies from his fear may find that he has only taken a shortcut to meet it."
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Children of Hurin
Photography by Erik Johansson
#tolkien #thechildrenofhurin
"No, Fridolph, bother all this learning. I can't study anymore because I must climb the mast to see what kind of weather we're going to have tomorrow."
Astrid Lindgren, Pippi Longstocking
#pippilongstocking #astridlindgren
http://thebookkeepersite.wordpress.com/2017/10/19/im-going-to-read-every-book-th...
"Every great and commanding moment in the annals of the world is the triumph of some enthusiasm."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
#ralphwaldoemerson #reading #books #enthusiasm #passion
"Stories are light. Light is precious in a world so dark. Begin at the beginning. Tell Gregory a story. Make some light."
Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Despereaux
#katedicamillo #thetaleofdespereaux #reading
"Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden."
Cormac McCarthy, The Road
#cormacmccarthy #theroad #classics #literature #reading
Artwork by Anders Anderson
Fiction is the response to a deep and always hidden wound.
Gustave Flaubert, Letters
#flaubert, #reading #books #classics #literature #whyweread
There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.
Shel Silverstein, Where the Sidewalk Ends
#shelsilverstein #wherethesidewalkends #reading #books #classics #poetry
"I believe that today, more than ever, a book should be sought after even if it has only one great page in it. We must search for fragments, splinters, toenails, anything that has ore in it, anything that is capable of resuscitating the body and the soul.
Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn
#henrymiller #tropicofcapricorn #reading #books #classics #literature #bestbooks
Artwork by Eon Burchman
"To sell your soul is the easiest thing in the world. That's what everybody does every hour of his life. If I asked you to keep your soul - would you understand why that's much harder? "
Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead
#aynrand #thefountainhead #reading #literature #bibliophile #classics
I'm so enjoying my current Litsy Reading Challenge that I've made one of my own. This one is intended to extend my reading in all ways uncomfortable. While I thought I read widely, I have since dicovered that I actually don't!
#litsy #litsyreadingchallenge #readwidely #readwildly #reading #books
https://thebookkeepersite.wordpress.com/2018/05/15/reading/
"A classic is a book that has never finished what it has to say."
Italo Calvino, The Uses of Literature
#italocalvino #theusesofliterature #reading #books #classics #literature #bestbooks
"The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries as it is - marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state."
Joseph Conrad, The Shadow Line
#josephconrad #theshadowline #reading #literature #theworld
"The sea can do craziness, it can do smooth, it can lie down like silk breathing or toss havoc shoreward; it can give gifts ot withhold all; it can rise, ebb, froth like an incoming frenzy of fountains, or it can sweet-talk entirely. As I can too, and so, no doubt, can you, and you."
Mary Oliver, A Thousand Mornings
#maryoliver #athousandmornings #thesea #reading #books
"We still and always want waking."
Annie Dillard, The Writing Life
#anniedillard #thewritinglife #reading #books #writing
Artwork by Leng Jun
"...and everything burned in blue, everything a star."
Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets
Artwork by Pascal Campion
#pabloneruda #100lovesonnets #poetry #reading
Sunrise
A Feast for Crows
Holy Cow
The Uncommon Reader (brilliant)
The Paris Wife
In the Company of Rilke
The Magic Mountain
#litsy #litsyreadingchallenge #readwidely
"There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them."
Joseph Brodsky, Collected Poems in English
#josephbrodsky #poets #reading #books
"Not all those who wander are lost."
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
#jrrtolkien #thefellowshipofthering #fantasy #classics #reading #bibliophile
"For me, the greater part of writing is daydreaming, dreaming the dream of my story until it hatches out - the writing down of it I find hard. But I love finishing it, then holding the book in my hand and sharing my dream with my readers."
Michael Morpurgo
#michaelmorpurgo #gentlegiant #youngreaders #michaelforeman #picturebooks #reading
"A good bookshop is just a genteel Black Hole that knows how to read."
Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!
#terrypratchett #guardsguards #reading #fantasy #books #bookshops
"The greatest masterpiece in literature
is only a dictionary
out of order."
Jean Cocteau
Young Man Reading by Ignis Bednarik
#jeancocteau #reading #books #literature
"It follows as surely as night follows day that the home is a hotbed of ineffectiveness, from grossly inadequate parenting skills through culinary failure to complete ineptitude in the do it yourself department. To err is human; to err repeatedly just makes us more human.
Jonathan Biggins, The 700 Habits of Highly Ineffective People
http//:thebookkeepersite.wordpress.com/2017/10/09/thea-stilton-i-just-love-you-so-much/
The sun the sun
comes around the corner
like a shining knight of old
galloping over the landscape
on the horses of morning
And shaking his lance over us
on trance of night
awakens us to speak or sing
to banish death and darkness
And each steed a word
each verb a stallion
reared up against all ignorance
Untamed rampant radicals
in dictionaries of light
Dictionaries of Light, Lawrence Ferlinghetti
#lawrenceferlinghetti #dictionariesoflight
1. Sunrise by Dominic Cooper (purple)
2. In the Company of Rilke by Stephanie Dowrick (green)
This exercise really does expand your reading.
#litsy #litsyreadingchallenge #rilke #stephaniedowrick #poetry
"A library is like an island in the middle of a vast sea of ignorance, particularly if the library is very tall and the surrounding area has been flooded. "
Lemony Snicket, Horseradish
#lemonysnicket #horseradish #reading #books #libraries
"....outer standstill....inner movement. ..."
Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet
#rainermariarilke #letterstoayoungpoet #reading #books #libraries #bibliophile
Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in the grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Rumi, from A Great Wagon
#rumi #poetry #spiritual #agreatwagon
"People can lose their lives in libraries. They ought to be warned."
Saul Bellow
#saulbellow #reading #libraries #books #literature #lovetoread
"Books should go where they will be most appreciated, and not sit unread, gathering dust on a forgotten shelf, don't you agree?"
Christopher Paolini, Brisingr
#brisingr #christopherpaolini #youngreaders #fantasy #dragons
