“Fitzgerald was a better just plain writer than all of us put together.”
JOHN O’HARA writing to JOHN STEINBECK,
SOURCE: The Selected Letters of John O’Hara (1978)
Archives for posts with tag: Quotes
He had one of the rarest qualities in all literature, and it’s a great shame that the word for it has been thoroughly debased by the cosmetic racketeers, so that one is almost ashamed to use it to describe a real distinction. Nevertheless, the word is charm — charm as Keats would have used it. Who has it today? It’s not a matter of pretty writing or clear style. It’s a kind of subdued magic, controlled and exquisite, the sort of thing you get from good string quartettes.”
RAYMOND CHANDLER referring to F. Scott Fitzgerald in a 1950 letter to a friend
Photo: Carl Van Vechten, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Van Vechten Collection, reproduction number LC-USZ62-88103 DLC.
“Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. I am haunted by waters.”
NORMAN MACLEAN, A River Runs Through It and Other Stories
PHOTO: “The Tetons and the Snake River” (1942), Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, by Ansel Adams. National Archives and Records Administration, Records of the National Park Service. (79-AAG-1)
“We age not by holding on to youth, but by letting ourselves grow and embracing whatever youthful parts that remain.” KEITH RICHARDS
PHOTO: Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards reads by the fire at his Weston, Connecticut, home in September 1977. Known as one of the most iconic rock musicians, Richards is an avid reader who owns an extensive library. Photo by Ken Regan, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.” CHARLES BUKOWSKI
This portrait of Charles Bukowski by Dana Laina (ALL RIGHTS RESERVED) is featured in the Silver Birch Press Bukowski Anthology, a collection of poetry & prose about Charles Bukowski as well as portraits of the author from over 75 writers and artists around the world.
…our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.” M. SCOTT PECK
Photo: John Payne
“If there were a little more silence, if we all kept quiet…maybe we could understand something.” FEDERICO FELLINI
Photo: John Payne
“He had one of the rarest qualities in all literature, and it’s a great shame that the word for it has been thoroughly debased by the cosmetic racketeers, so that one is almost ashamed to use it to describe a real distinction. Nevertheless, the word is charm — charm as Keats would have used it. Who has it today? It’s not a matter of pretty writing or clear style. It’s a kind of subdued magic, controlled and exquisite, the sort of thing you get from good string quartettes.”
RAYMOND CHANDLER referring to F. Scott Fitzgerald in a 1950 letter to a friend
Photo: Carl Van Vechten, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Van Vechten Collection, reproduction number LC-USZ62-88103 DLC.
“That night, after the movie, driving my father’s car along the country roads, I began to wonder how real the landscape truly was, and how much of a dream is a dream.” Don DeLillo, AMERICANA
Photo: Candida Godson
“Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill. Without books, the development of civilization would have been impossible. They are engines of change (as the poet said), windows on the world and lighthouses erected in the sea of time. They are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind. Books are humanity in print.” BARBARA TUCHMAN
Illustration: “Monument of Books” by Anca Benera, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Silver Birch Press 