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“Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me.”
― Moby-Dick or, The Whale
― Moby-Dick or, The Whale
“I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound or stab us. If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is my belief.”
―
―
“By its nature, the metropolis provides what otherwise could be given only by traveling; namely, the strange.”
― The Death and Life of Great American Cities
― The Death and Life of Great American Cities
“Where misunderstanding serves others as an advantage, one is helpless to make oneself understood”
― The Liberal Imagination: Essays on Literature and Society
― The Liberal Imagination: Essays on Literature and Society
“Life's single lesson: that there is more accident to it than a man can ever admit to in a lifetime and stay sane.”
― V.
― V.
The (Mostly) Dead Writers Society
— 203 members
— last activity 3 hours, 17 min ago
The (Mostly) Dead Writers Society is a group for readers who enjoy books that have been around for a while, written by authors who have shuffled off t ...more
Daniel’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Daniel’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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