Diane > Diane's Quotes

“When I have a little money, I buy books; and if I have any left, I buy food and clothes.”
― Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus

“A journey, after all, neither begins in the instant we set out, nor ends when we have reached our door step once again. It starts much earlier and is really never over, because the film of memory continues running on inside of us long after we have come to a physical standstill. Indeed, there exists something like a contagion of travel, and the disease is essentially incurable.”
― Ryszard Kapuściński, Travels with Herodotus

“in reference to Persepolis and all palaces, cities and temples of the past: could these wonders have come into being without that suffering? without the overseer's whip, the slave's fear, the ruler's vanity? was not the monumentality of past epochs created by that which is negative and evil in man?”
― Ryszard Kapuscinski, Travels with Herodotus

“on war and conquest: in the realm of human affairs one also needs a pretext. it is important to give it the rank of a universal imperative or of a divine commandment. The range of choices is not great; either it is that we must defend ourselves, or that we have an obligation to help others, or that we are fulfilling heaven's will. the optimal pretext would link all three of the motives.”
― Ryszard Kapuscinski, Travels with Herodotus

“There is no such thing as a weird human being, It's just that some people require more understanding than others.”
― Tom Robbins

“You should never hesitate to trade your cow for a handful of magic beans.”
― Tom Robbins

“We are our own dragons as well as our own heroes, and we have to rescue ourselves from ourselves.”
― Tom Robbins, Still Life with Woodpecker

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
― Leo Tolstoy , Anna Karenina

“the drum is joy and the river is joy, which is why so many songs name the Magdalena.”
― Wade Davis, Magdalena: River of Dreams

“Picking five favorite books is like picking the five body parts you'd most like not to lose.”
― Neil Gaiman

“There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

[Kung Fu Monkey -- Ephemera, blog post, March 19, 2009]”
― John Rogers