The mechanic starts talking, and it's pure Tyler Durden.
"I see the strongest and the smartest men who have ever lived," he says, his face outlined against the stars in the driver's window, "and these men are pumping gas and waiting tables."
The drop of his forehead, his brow, the slope of his nose, his eyelashes and the curve of his eyes, the plastic profile of his mouth, talking, these are all outlined in black against the stars."
"If we could put these men in training camps and finish raising them."
"All a gun does is focus an explosion in one direction."
"You have a class of young strong men and women, and they want to give their lives to something. Advertising has these people chasing cars and clothes they don't need. Generations have been working in jobs they hate, just so they can buy what they don't really need."
"We don't have a great war in our generation, or a great depression, but we do, we have a great war of the spirit. We have a great revolution against the culture. The great depression is our lives. We have a spiritual depression."
- Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club.
#chuckpalahniuk
"I see the strongest and the smartest men who have ever lived," he says, his face outlined against the stars in the driver's window, "and these men are pumping gas and waiting tables."
The drop of his forehead, his brow, the slope of his nose, his eyelashes and the curve of his eyes, the plastic profile of his mouth, talking, these are all outlined in black against the stars."
"If we could put these men in training camps and finish raising them."
"All a gun does is focus an explosion in one direction."
"You have a class of young strong men and women, and they want to give their lives to something. Advertising has these people chasing cars and clothes they don't need. Generations have been working in jobs they hate, just so they can buy what they don't really need."
"We don't have a great war in our generation, or a great depression, but we do, we have a great war of the spirit. We have a great revolution against the culture. The great depression is our lives. We have a spiritual depression."
- Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club.
#chuckpalahniuk
👍2
“Some birds are not meant to be caged, that's all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild. So you let them go, or when you open the cage to feed them they somehow fly out past you. And the part of you that knows it was wrong to imprison them in the first place rejoices, but still, the place where you live is that much more drab and empty for their departure.”
- Stephen King, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.
#stephenking
- Stephen King, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.
#stephenking
👍3😢1
“There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.”
- Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey.
#janeausten
- Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey.
#janeausten
❤1
“I thought that the light-house looked lovely as hope,
That star on life's tremulous ocean.”
- Thomas Moore.
#thomasmoore
That star on life's tremulous ocean.”
- Thomas Moore.
#thomasmoore
“You can never rouse Harris. There is no poetry about Harris - no wild yearning for the unattainable. Harris never "weeps, he knows not why." If Harris's eyes fill with tears, you can bet it is because Harris has been eating raw onions, or has put too much Worcester over his chop.
If you were to stand at night by the sea-shore with Harris, and say:
"Hark! do you not hear? Is it but the mermaids singing deep below the waving waters; or sad spirits, chanting dirges for white corpses held by seaweed?" Harris would take you by the arm, and say:
"I know what it is, old man; you've got a chill. Now you come along with me. I know a place round the corner here, where you can get a drop of the finest Scotch whisky you ever tasted-put you right in less than no time."
Harris always does know a place round the corner where you can get something brilliant in the drinking line. I believe that if you met Harris up in Paradise (supposing such a thing likely), he would immediately greet you with:
"So glad you've come, old fellow; I've found a nice place round the corner here, where you can get some really first-class nectar.”
- Jerome K. Jerome, Three Men in a Boat.
#jeromekjerome
If you were to stand at night by the sea-shore with Harris, and say:
"Hark! do you not hear? Is it but the mermaids singing deep below the waving waters; or sad spirits, chanting dirges for white corpses held by seaweed?" Harris would take you by the arm, and say:
"I know what it is, old man; you've got a chill. Now you come along with me. I know a place round the corner here, where you can get a drop of the finest Scotch whisky you ever tasted-put you right in less than no time."
Harris always does know a place round the corner where you can get something brilliant in the drinking line. I believe that if you met Harris up in Paradise (supposing such a thing likely), he would immediately greet you with:
"So glad you've come, old fellow; I've found a nice place round the corner here, where you can get some really first-class nectar.”
- Jerome K. Jerome, Three Men in a Boat.
#jeromekjerome
👍1
“A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.”
- G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man.
#gkchesterton
- G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man.
#gkchesterton
🔥2
“Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.”
- Mark Twain.
#marktwain
- Mark Twain.
#marktwain
👍2
“Grief can destroy you - or focus you. You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you alone. OR you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn't allow yourself to consider the sacredness of it. But when it's over and you're alone, you begin to see that it wasn't just a movie and a dinner together, not just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill. It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it. The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can't get off your knees for a long time, you're driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by gratitude for what preceded the loss. And the ache is always there, but one day not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life.”
- Dean Koontz, Odd Hours.
#deankoontz
- Dean Koontz, Odd Hours.
#deankoontz
👍2
“I will love you for ever, whatever happens. Till I die and after I die, and when I find my way out of the land of the dead I’ll drift about forever, all my atoms, till I find you again…”
- Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass.
Translation
#philippullman
- Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass.
Translation
#philippullman
❤4👍2
“I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.”
- Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird.
Translation
#harperlee
- Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird.
Translation
#harperlee
🔥7👍3🤔1
”You're never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true.”
- Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah.
Translation
#richardbach
- Richard Bach, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah.
Translation
#richardbach
👍8
“I consider that a man's brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things, so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skillful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.”
- Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet.
Translation
#arthurconandoyle
- Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet.
Translation
#arthurconandoyle
👍12
“Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.”
- Robert Louis Stevenson.
Translation
#robertlouisstevenson
- Robert Louis Stevenson.
Translation
#robertlouisstevenson
👍3
“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”
- C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves.
Translation
#cslewis
- C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves.
Translation
#cslewis
🔥7👍2
The truly manly ones are those who have the spark, and refuse to let it be extinguished; those who know that the true values are the vital values, not the £ s. d. and falling-into-a-good-post and the kicked-backside-of-the-Empire values.
- Richard Aldington, Death of a Hero.
Translation
#richardaldington
- Richard Aldington, Death of a Hero.
Translation
#richardaldington
❤1
“As they passed the rows of houses they saw through the open doors that men were sweeping and dusting and washing dishes, while the women sat around in groups, gossiping and laughing.
'What has happened?' the Scarecrow asked a sad-looking man with a bushy beard, who wore an apron and was wheeling a baby carriage along the sidewalk.
'Why, we've had a revolution, your Majesty -- as you ought to know very well,' replied the man; 'and since you went away the women have been running things to suit themselves. I'm glad you have decided to come back and restore order, for doing housework and minding the children is wearing out the strength of every man in the Emerald City.'
'Hm!' said the Scarecrow, thoughtfully. 'If it is such hard work as you say, how did the women manage it so easily?'
'I really do not know,' replied the man, with a deep sigh. 'Perhaps the women are made of cast-iron.”
- Lyman Frank Baum, The Marvelous Land of Oz.
Translation
#lymanfrankbaum
'What has happened?' the Scarecrow asked a sad-looking man with a bushy beard, who wore an apron and was wheeling a baby carriage along the sidewalk.
'Why, we've had a revolution, your Majesty -- as you ought to know very well,' replied the man; 'and since you went away the women have been running things to suit themselves. I'm glad you have decided to come back and restore order, for doing housework and minding the children is wearing out the strength of every man in the Emerald City.'
'Hm!' said the Scarecrow, thoughtfully. 'If it is such hard work as you say, how did the women manage it so easily?'
'I really do not know,' replied the man, with a deep sigh. 'Perhaps the women are made of cast-iron.”
- Lyman Frank Baum, The Marvelous Land of Oz.
Translation
#lymanfrankbaum
“Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts.”
- Charles Dickens.
Translation
#charlesdickens
- Charles Dickens.
Translation
#charlesdickens
❤2
“Every life is in many days, day after day. We walk through ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, widows, brothers-in-love, but always meeting ourselves.”
- James Joyce, Ulysses.
Translation
#jamesjoyce
- James Joyce, Ulysses.
Translation
#jamesjoyce
❤3
“Only in rare instances and with rare individuals does there seem to be any guiding light from within.”
- Theodore Dreiser, Jennie Gerhardt.
Translation
#theodoredreiser
- Theodore Dreiser, Jennie Gerhardt.
Translation
#theodoredreiser
❤2👍1
“Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly -- that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to oneself. Of course they are charitable. They feed the hungry, and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion -- these are the two things that govern us.”
- Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Stories.
Translation
#oscarwilde
- Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Stories.
Translation
#oscarwilde
👍5
“We accept the love we think we deserve.”
- Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
Translation
#stephenchbosky
- Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
Translation
#stephenchbosky
❤5