Andrew Bourne

“Homer never wondered whether, after their many hand-to-hand struggles, Achilles or Ajax still had all their teeth.”
― Milan Kundera, The Curtain: An Essay in Seven Parts

“You will be identified as thin-skinned and moody; in reaction you will identify yourself as civilized and sensitive. You will barricade yourself in that preposterous condition known as self-respect.”
― Alphonso Lingis, Dangerous Emotions

“Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. Waterton tells me that the crocodile does not change,—that a cayman, in fact, or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he was in the time of the Pharaohs. That may be; but the reason is that the crocodile does not live fast—he is a slow coach. I believe it is generally understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a blockhead. It is my own impression that the Pharaohs were also blockheads.”
― Thomas de Quincey

“One day a man invited him into a richly furnished house, saying 'be careful not to spit on the floor.' Diogenes, who needed to spit, spat in his face, exclaiming that it was the only dirty place he could find where spitting was permitted.”
― Diogenes Laertius, The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers