Jackie

“A rope is not to be mentioned in the house of him who has been hanged.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote De La Mancha Complete In Two Parts

“There are many ways to find a unicorn. But the simplest is just to let him find you instead. If you’ve ever seen one, you will know that ages can go by without your hearing any mention of them, and in time you might forget they exist altogether. And yet… Sooner or later, they always come back. I’ve experienced this myself often. Last time this happened to me, I was at a Book Fair. There was an odd space, a kind of corridor that was closed-off and dark, and no one was going in. No sooner had I turned the corner than I saw the unicorn. There he was, in a book called Unicorns I Have Known. I’m not sure exactly why, but, from then on, Roger and I have talked about unicorns many times. It’s always the same: whenever you start forgetting about them, something shows up to remind you. As legend has it, only the pure of heart can see them. So if you want to have the experience for yourself: believe. And then they will appear to you, in books, in paintings, in quotations. Unicorns are in Shakespeare, in Lewis Carroll, and many other authors. All of a sudden, you turn a page or you go online and there they are – waiting for you.
Claudia de Moraes, 1997”
― Roger Mello, Griso: The One and Only

“The first motivation could be called political: If you can't or won't understand the Bible, others surely will interpret it for you. The second could be called cultural or literary: Within this culture you can't be fully literature or creative, artistically or rhetorically, without an acquaintance with the Bible. But now we come to the third and most personal reason: You also can't be spiritually mature or wise simply by rejecting the Bible as oppressive. The oppressive uses of the Bible are real, but unless you learn to understand that there are other readings possible, the Bible will, indeed, simply continue to be a source of oppression for you, and not a source of inspiration, liberation, creation, and even exultation as you understand anew for yourself, at a deep and less literal level.”
― John A. Buehrens, Understanding the Bible: An Introduction for Skeptics, Seekers, and Religious Liberals

“You and I know that such writing—unlike the worthier phonetic systems—retards the progress of man. It should have died out long ago like Egyptian hieroglyphics. Why doesn't it die out in me? Is it because I studied only Chinese classics when I was young? Is this the reason my brain is alive with this script rooted in the history of Asia and the dim past of man? How absurd! What incredible childishness! With seventeen flying brush-strokes to make with such care that monosyllabic sound—Lung—meaning dragon! Then with what fine glow and fondness the calligrapher looks at his work! And there is no dragon, any more than an angel or devil. How can man waste his brains on such a thing?”
― Younghill Kang, East Goes West: The Making of an Oriental Yankee