Benedict Furness

“Before you become a writer you must first become a reader. Every hour spent reading is an hour spent learning to write;”
― Robert Macfarlane, Landmarks

“A story must be judged according to whether it makes sense. And 'making sense' must be here understood in its most direct meaning: to make sense is to enliven the senses. A story that makes sense is one that stirs the senses from their slumber, one that opens the eyes and the ears to their real surroundings, tuning the tongue to the actual tastes in the air and sending chills of recognition along the surface of the skin. To make sense is to release the body from the constraints imposed by outworn ways of speaking, and hence to renew and rejuvenate one's felt awareness of the world. It is to make the senses wake up to where they are.”
― David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.”
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America

“You can't measure the mutual affection of two human beings by the number of words they exchange.”
― Milan Kundera