“سمّاني الناس مجنونا، غير أن العلم لم يكشف لنا بعد فيما إذا كان الجنون ذروة الذكاء أم لا، وفيما إذا كان كل ما يسمى مجدا وكل ما يسمى عمقا ليسا آتيين من مرض فكري، من حالة روحية تتمجد وتنمو على حساب الذهن العام. هؤلاء الذين يحلمون وهم أيقاظ يعرفون أشياء كثيرة تفلت من هؤلاء الذين لا يحلمون إلا وهم نيام. إنهم يلتقطون - في رؤاهم المغيّمة - لمحات من الأبدية، وإذ يستيقظون يرتعشون لتنبههم أنهم كانوا للحظةٍ على ضفة السر العظيم. إنهم يدركون - جزءا فجزءا - شيئا من معرفة الخير، وأكثر أيضا من علم الشر. وهم - بلا دفة ولا بوصلة - يخترقون المحيط الواسع للضياء الذي لا يوصف.”
― مغامرات وأسرار
― مغامرات وأسرار
“I thought that maybe what had happened had been for the best. The part of me which made the mistake with the buck, letting it get the better of me for a moment, might still be around if that acid test hadn't found it out. The incompetent or misguided general had been dismissed.”
― The Wasp Factory
― The Wasp Factory
“Do you know the difference between neurotics and psychotics?” He answered before I could speak, “Neurotics build castles in the sky; psychotics move into them.” And”
― Assuming Names: a con artist's masquerade
― Assuming Names: a con artist's masquerade
“In science too, one dedicates his life to an Albanian snail, another to a virus. Darwin gave eight years to barnacles. And in wise later life, to earthworms. The Higgs boson, a tiny thing, perhaps not even a thing, was the lifetime's pursuit of thousands. To be bound in a nutshell, see the world in two inches of ivory, in a grain of sand. Why not, when all of literature, all of art, of human endeavor, is just a speck in the universe of possible things. And even this universe may be a speck in a multitude of actual and possible universes.
So why not be an owl poet?”
― Nutshell
So why not be an owl poet?”
― Nutshell
“Over a quarter of a century ago she and Vernon had made a household for almost a year, in a tiny rooftop flat on the rue de Seine. There were always damp towels on the floor then, and cataracts of her underwear tumbling from drawers she never closed, a big ironing board that was never folded away, and in the one overfilled wardrobe dresses , crushed and shouldering sideways like commuters on the metro. Magazines, makeup, bank statements, bead necklaces, flowers, knickers, ashtrays, invitations, tampons, LPs, airplane tickets, high heeled shoes- not a single surface was left uncovered by something of Molly's, so that when Vernon was meant to be working at home, he took to writing in a cafe along the street. And yet each morning she arose fresh from the shell of this girly squalor, like a Botticelli Venus, to present herself, not naked, of course, but sleekly groomed, at the offices of Paris Vogue.”
― Amsterdam
― Amsterdam
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