The life of sensation is the life of greed; it requires more and more. The life of the spirit requires less and… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“Why are we reading, if not in hope of beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? Can the writer… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by. — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
You can, in short, lead the life of the mind, which is, despite some appalling frustrations, the happiest life on earth. And… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
The reader's ear must adjust down from loud life to the subtle, imaginary sounds of the written word. An ordinary reader picking… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
Why are we reading, if not in hope of beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“I don't know what it is about fecundity that so appalls. I suppose it is the teeming evidence that birth and growth,… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“It should surprise no one that the life of the writer--such as it is--is colorless to the point of sensory deprivation. Many… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
We teach our children one thing only, as we were taught: to wake up. We teach our children to look alive there,… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“Children...wake up and find themselves here, discover themselves to have been here all along; is this sad? They wake like sleepwalkers, in… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“She bade solitude good-bye. Good-bye to no schedule but whim; good-bye to her life among no things but her own and each… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“I am sitting under a sycamore by Tinker Creek. I am really here, alive on the intricate earth under trees. But under… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“The creator is not puritan. A creature need not work for a living; creatures may simply steal and suck and be blessed… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
The dedicated life is worth living. You must give with your whole heart. — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
As a life's work, I would remember everything - everything, against loss. I would go through life like a plankton net. — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading--that is a good life. A day that… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“You can live as a particle crashing about and colliding in a welter of materials with god, or you can live as… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
I think it would be well, and proper, and obedient, and pure, to grasp your one necessity and not let it go,… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
There is always the temptation in life to diddle around making itsy-bitsy friends and meals and journeys for years on end. It… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“This is a spendthrift economy; though nothing is lost, all is spent.” — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
Nothing moves a woman so deeply as the boyhood of the man she loves. — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
We live in all we seek. The hidden shows up in too-plain sight. It lives captive on the face of the obvious - the… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“...The mockingbird took a single step into the air and dropped. His wings were still folded against his sides as though he were singing… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“Father had stretched out his long legs and was tilting back in his chair. Mother sat with her knees crossed, in blue slacks, smoking… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
I am a frayed and nibbled survivor in a fallen world, and I am getting along. I am aging and eaten and have done… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
It should surprise no one that the life of the writer - such as it is - is colorless to the point of sensory… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
It is madness to wear ladies' straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
The sense impressions of one-celled animals are not edited for the brain. This is philosophically interesting in a rather mournful way, since it means… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
“What can we make of the inexpressible joy of children? It is a kind of gratitude, I think—the gratitude of the ten-year-old who wakes… — Annie Dillard Copy Share Image
