“For what was civilization but the intellect’s ascendancy out of the doldrums of necessity (shelter, sustenance and survival) into the ether of the finely superfluous (poetry, handbags and haute cuisine)?” — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
But for me, dinner at a fine restaurant was the ultimate luxury. It was the very height of civilization. For what was civilization but the intellect's ascendancy out of the doldrums of necessity (shelter, sustenance and survival) into the ether… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“To have even one year when you're presented with choices that can alter your circumstances, your character, your course- that's by the grace of… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“Rather than sitting in orderly rows in a schoolhouse, wouldn't one be better served by working her way towards an actual horizon, so that… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
That's how quickly New York City comes about - like a weather wane - or the head of a cobra. Time tells which. — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“Mostly, he said, I've been thinking about what I'm not going to do. When I think of the last few years, I've been hounded by regrets for what's already happened and fears for what might. By nostalgia for what I've lost and desire for what I don't have. All this wanting and not wanting. It's worn me out. For once,… — Amor Towles Copy Share
“In the doleful court behind my building a patchwork of windows was all that separated me from a hundred muted lives being led without… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“That is how time passes when one is left waiting unaccountably. The hours become interminable. The minutes relentless. And the seconds? Why, not only… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“Mishka would pine for Katerina the rest of his life! Never again would he walk Nevsky Prospekt, however they chose to rename it, without feeling an unbearable sense of loss. And that is just how it should be. That sense of loss is exactly what we must anticipate, prepare for, and cherish to the last of our days; for it… — Amor Towles Copy Share
Every year, I would spend weeks at a time in the hotels of distant cities. — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“For eventually, we come to hold our dearest possessions more closely than we hold our friends.” — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
“As we age, we are bound to find comfort from the notion that it takes generations for a way of life to fade. We are familiar with the songs our grandparents favored, after all, even though we never danced to them ourselves. At festive holidays, the recipes we pull from the drawer are routinely decades old, and in some cases… — Amor Towles Copy Share
“For it is the role of the parent to express his concerns and then take three steps back. Not one, mind you, not two, but three. Or maybe four. (But by no means five.) Yes, a parent should share his hesitations and then take three or four steps back, so that the child can make a decision by herself—even when… — Amor Towles Copy Share
“But I've come to realie that however blue my circumstance,s if after finishing a chapter of a Dickens novel I feel a miss-my-stop-on-the-train sort… — Amor Towles Copy Share Image
