Big Books of 2026

Bex Appleton > Bex's Quotes

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  • #1
    Maira Kalman
    “My dream is to walk around the world. A smallish backpack, all essentials neatly in place. A camera. A notebook. A traveling paint set. A hat. Good shoes. A nice pleated (green?) skirt for the occasional seaside hotel afternoon dance.”
    ― Maira Kalman, The Principles of Uncertainty
    tags: dream, travel
    298 likes

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  • #2
    Maira Kalman
    “I tell you these stories because these things happen to everyone. It's not about being starched or polished or cute or polite. It's about having ears that stick out, about breaking yet another glass. It's about seeing something for the first time and making a million mistakes and not ever getting completely discouraged.”
    ― Maira Kalman
    44 likes

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  • #3
    Maira Kalman
    “Everyone I know is looking for solace, hope and a tasty snack.”
    ― Maira Kalman
    tags: life
    25 likes

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  • #4
    Maira Kalman
    “Washing dishes is the anecdote to confusion. I know that for a fact.”
    ― Maira Kalman, The Principles of Uncertainty
    17 likes

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  • #5
    Maira Kalman
    “Isn't that the only way to curate a life? To live among things that make you gasp with delight?”
    ― Maira Kalman, My Favorite Things
    tags: curating, delight, favourite-things, joy, life
    13 likes

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  • #6
    Maira Kalman
    “If you go too fast you might not notice everything. On the other hand, you don't want to be late.”
    ― Maira Kalman
    tags: awareness, fast, late
    5 likes

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  • #7
    Maira Kalman
    “All terrific but the people. THE PEOPLE. Everyone looks so exalted, or so wretched, or so spiffy, so funny, so splendid. If you are ever bored or blue, stand on the street corner for half an hour.”
    ― Maira Kalman
    tags: maira-kalman, people, the-principles-of-uncertainty
    4 likes

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  • #8
    Maira Kalman
    “Useless and precious objects. Taking up space. Taking up time.”
    ― Maira Kalman, My Favorite Things
    tags: minimalism, simplicity, space, things, things-that-matter-in-life, time
    2 likes

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  • #9
    Ken Robinson
    “Human communities depend upon a diversity of talent not a singular conception of ability”
    ― Sir Ken Robinson
    53 likes

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  • #10
    Ken Robinson
    “Creativity is as important as literacy”
    ― Ken Robinson
    tags: creativity, ken-robinson, school-system, ted-talks
    230 likes

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  • #11
    Ken Robinson
    “Human resources are like natural resources; they're often buried deep. You have to go looking for them, they're not just lying around on the surface. You have to create the circumstances where they show themselves.”
    ― Ken Robinson
    tags: creativity, education, human-resources, meaning-of-life, talent
    185 likes

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  • #12
    Ken Robinson
    “Curiosity is the engine of achievement.”
    ― Ken Robinson
    tags: curiosity, motivation, psychology
    116 likes

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  • #13
    Ken Robinson
    “We have sold ourselves into a fast food model of education, and it's impoverishing our spirit and our energies as much as fast food is depleting our physical bodies.”
    ― Ken Robinson
    tags: creativity, education, fast-food
    87 likes

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  • #14
    William Martin
    “Do not ask your children
    to strive for extraordinary lives.
    Such striving may seem admirable,
    but it is the way of foolishness.
    Help them instead to find the wonder
    and the marvel of an ordinary life.
    Show them the joy of tasting
    tomatoes, apples and pears.
    Show them how to cry
    when pets and people die.
    Show them the infinite pleasure
    in the touch of a hand.
    And make the ordinary come alive for them.
    The extraordinary will take care of itself.”
    ― William Martin, The Parent's Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents
    tags: admirable, advice, children, extraordinary, life, lives, ordinary
    1138 likes

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  • #15
    W.H. Auden
    “Poetry might be defined as the clear expression of mixed feelings.”
    ― W.H. Auden, New Year Letter
    tags: poetry
    1796 likes

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  • #16
    W.H. Auden
    “Thank God for books as an alternative to conversation.”
    ― W.H. Auden
    380 likes

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  • #17
    John Berger
    “When we read a story, we inhabit it. The covers of the book are like a roof and four walls. What is to happen next will take place within the four walls of the story. And this is possible because the story's voice makes everything its own.”
    ― John Berger, Keeping a Rendezvous: Essays
    tags: books, reading, stories, story
    1648 likes

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  • #18
    Ernest Hemingway
    “You expected to be sad in the fall. Part of you died each year when the leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare against the wind and the cold, wintery light. But you knew there would always be the spring, as you knew the river would flow again after it was frozen. When the cold rains kept on and killed the spring, it was as though a young person died for no reason.”
    ― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
    2123 likes

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  • #19
    Ernest Hemingway
    “Never to go on trips with anyone you do not love.”
    ― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
    1193 likes

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  • #20
    Ernest Hemingway
    “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”
    ― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
    tags: paris
    1107 likes

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  • #21
    Annie Ernaux
    “Maybe the true purpose of my life is for my body, my sensations and my thoughts to become writing, in other words, something intelligible and universal, causing my existence to merge into the lives and heads of other people.”
    ― Annie Ernaux, Happening
    178 likes

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  • #22
    Sally Rooney
    “It was culture as class performance, literature fetishised for its ability to take educated people on false emotional journeys, so that they might afterwards feel superior to the uneducated people whose emotional journeys they liked to read about.”
    ― Sally Rooney, Normal People
    tags: art, culture, intellectual-snobbery, literature, snobbery
    1444 likes

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  • #23
    Sally Rooney
    “No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, she thought, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not.”
    ― Sally Rooney, Normal People
    1178 likes

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  • #24
    Sally Rooney
    “Marianne had the sense that her real life was happening somewhere very far away, happening without her, and she didn't know if she would ever find out where it was or become part of it.”
    ― Sally Rooney, Normal People
    2387 likes

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  • #25
    Gaston Bachelard
    “I should say: the house shelters day-dreaming, the house protects the dreamer, the house allows one to dream in peace.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard , The Poetics of Space
    tags: dream, house, privacy, space
    250 likes

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  • #26
    Gaston Bachelard
    “To feel most beautifully alive means to be reading something beautiful, ready always to apprehend in the flow of language the sudden flash of poetry.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard
    tags: books, language, literature, poetry, reading, words
    178 likes

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  • #27
    Gaston Bachelard
    “We comfort ourselves by reliving memories of protection. Something closed must retain our memories, while leaving them their original value as images. Memories of the outside world will never have the same tonality as those of home and, by recalling these memories, we add to our store of dreams; we are never real historians, but always near poets, and our emotion is perhaps nothing but an expression of a poetry that was lost.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
    tags: 6, comfort, home, memory, safety, space
    154 likes

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  • #28
    Gaston Bachelard
    “A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard
    tags: dreams, language, nature, phenomenology, words, writing
    80 likes

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  • #29
    Gaston Bachelard
    “We are never real historians, but always near poets, and our emotion is perhaps nothing but an expression of a poetry that was lost.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space
    70 likes

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  • #30
    Gaston Bachelard
    “The reveries of two solitary souls prepare the sweetness of loving.”
    ― Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Reverie: Childhood, Language, and the Cosmos
    39 likes



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Tags From Bex’s Quotes

dream
travel
life
curating
delight
favourite-things
joy
awareness
fast
late
maira-kalman
people
the-principles-of-uncertainty
minimalism
simplicity
space
things
things-that-matter-in-life
time
creativity
ken-robinson
school-system
ted-talks
education
human-resources
meaning-of-life
talent
curiosity
motivation
psychology
fast-food
admirable
advice
children
extraordinary
lives
ordinary
poetry
books
reading
stories
story
paris
art
culture
intellectual-snobbery
literature
snobbery
house
privacy
language
words
6
comfort
home
memory
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nature
phenomenology
writing