Literature Quotes · Page 29

Art is solace; art is vision, and when I pick up a literary work, I am a consumer of literature for its…

— Wole Soyinka

“Propping up a seat at the bar we devour chicken wings like life does dreams”

— David Louden

I made a compact with myself that in my person literature should stand by itself, of itself, and for itself.

— Charles Dickens

More than art, more than literature, music is universally accessible.

— Billy Joel

My definition of good literature is that which can be read by an educated reader, and reread with increased pleasure.

— Gene Wolfe

Any literature, when it arrives at being good literature, transcends genre.

— Vanna Bonta

In all primary school work the principle of multiple impressions is well recognized.

— William James

At one point in my life, I wanted to do a master's degree in Irish literature, but I ended up getting pregnant…

— Miriam Toews

If ideas are what feed serious literature and arresting language, who today is writing a novel of ideas (which can often mean…

— Cynthia Ozick

“That's sounds right. Another $5,000 went to dress up the Little League park where he had played so many games. Seems like…

— John Grisham

Life is not a PG feel-good movie. Real life often ends badly. Literature tries to document this reality, while showing us it…

— Matthew Quick

Readers are hungry to have their stories in the world, to see mirrors of themselves if the stories are about people like…

— Jacqueline Woodson

The French have a different take on photography than Americans do. They consider photography to be absolutely parallel to literature. That often…

— Ralph Gibson

This, indeed, is one of the eternal paradoxes of both life and literature-that without passion little gets done; yet, without control of…

— F. L. Lucas

In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavad-Gita, in comparison with which our modern…

— Henry David Thoreau

I began as a boy with artistic talent... as a visual artist... I thought that was what I'd become and in my…

— Russell Banks

I fell even more deeply in love with Tolkien's legendarium after studying Old English literature at uni, as I got a sense…

— Samantha Shannon

In France, we have laïcité, which means that atheism is almost our state religion. But I think a very important part of…

— Eugene Green

The best thing to do is to loosen my grip on my pen and let it go wandering about until it finds…

— Machado de Assis

“Left to itself every literature will exhaust its vitality, if it is not refreshed by the interest and contributions of a foreign…

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Dagwood Bumstead was a great unrecognized hero of American literature. He showed up every day, he got knocked down every day, he…

— James L. Brooks

The contradiction [trying to use Russian model to reshape Italy] grew to such an extent that I felt totally cut off from…

— Italo Calvino

I'm a reader. I like - I'm a great reader. I keep going back, though, to certain authors, just like I love…

— David Small

“People keep asking me, "Where do you get the ideas for your books?" From the worst moments in my life. I call…

— Sandy Nathan

“Poetry is a tool for writers to create literature in different forms of expression and messages. ”

— Vanessa M. Chattman

The excellence of this important contribution to genre literature CANNOT be overstated A masterwork.

— William F. Nolan

In French literature, you can choose a la carte; in Spanish literature, there is only the set meal.

— Jose Bergamin

Love is like a spice. It can sweeten your life - however, it can spoil it, too.

— Confucius

“I regained my soul through literature after those times I'd lost it to wild-eyed gypsy girls on the European streets.”

— Roman Payne

There are ten men in me and I do not know or understand one of them.

— Carl Sandburg

The social scene at the Harvard I knew was outside the rules of literature. It was less poignant.

— Lisa Brennan-Jobs

“Camp fires, like red, peculiar blossoms, dotted the night.”

— Stephen Crane

Learning and literature have a way of outlasting the civilization that made them.

— Dorothy L. Sayers

“It's true that a picture is worth a thousand words, but it's also true that a word is worth a thousand pictures.”

— Marty Johncox

Literature is about being a complex, contradictory human being.

— Julia Alvarez

“Literature is my Utopia...No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourse of my book-friends”

— Helen Keller

All good American literature is always interested in people who are ambiguously heroic, like Gatsby.

— John Green

Translation is the circulatory system of the world's literatures

— Susan Sontag

I studied English literature; I took 2 independent religion classes, but I wasn't a religion major really.

— Maggie Gyllenhaal

I believe that philosophy is part of literature, and not the reverse.

— Paul Virilio