Question of the Day | 08/16/2009 11:00 pm

What passage or passages from a book, poem, short story or other literary work moved you so much that you've never forgotten it?

Join Liz Smith, Joan Ganz Cooney, Julia Reed and Joni Evans in sharing the words that have moved you.

Liz Smith | 08/16/2009 11:00 pm

Liz Smith: 'For the Last 40 Years, I Introduced My Column With a Quote'

There is so much in so many of the books I’ve read that I feel like a parent with many children trying to say something that I’m sure will make them feel loved equally. I have already given my embrace to the thousands of quotations I have selected to open my column for the past 40 years.

I like E. L. Doctorow on writing: "It’s like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights. But you can make the whole trip that way." This seems to me would apply to any long-term chore.

Or Raymond Chandler: "Technique alone is just an embroidered potholder."

Or William Faulkner: "We will be judged on the splendor of our failures."

Or Emily Dickinson: "The pedigree of honey dost not concern the bee; A clover, anytime, to him is aristocracy."

And then I have loved an anonymous limerick:

"There once was a man from St. Paul, who went to a fancy dressed ball. He said, ‘Yes, I’ll risk it. I’ll go as a biscuit.’ And a dog ate him up in the hall."

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Joni Evans | 08/16/2009 11:00 pm

Joni Evans's Life-Defining Quote

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience." —Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

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Joan Ganz Cooney | 08/16/2009 11:00 pm

Joan Ganz Cooney Rattled by Two Poets

There are many lines and passages from poems that rattle around in my brain. One of my favorites is from a poem written by Robert Lowell to Elizabeth Hardwick:

"You were in your 20s and I, once, hand on glass and heart in mouth, outdrank the Rahvs in the heat of Greenwich Village, too boiled and shy and poker faced to make a pass." And another, Dylan Thomas’s: "Do not go gentle into that good night but rage, rage against the dying of the light."

2 Comments

Julia Reed | 08/17/2009 9:00 am

Julia Reed and the Discovery of Leonard Cohen

I was an impossibly romantic 16-year-old (wishing I were going on 30) in boarding school, already tragically mourning lost loves when I discovered Leonard Cohen, whose photograph I had plastered to the dorm room ceiling above my bed. I still love his poem "Travel," and hear its lines in my head. "Loving you, flesh to flesh to flesh, I often thought of travelling penniless to some mud throne Where a master might instruct me how to plot My life away from pain, to love alone In the bruiseless embrace of stone and lake. Lost in the fields of your hair I was never lost Enough to lose a way I had to take … Now I know why many men have stopped and wept Halfway between the loves they leave and seek, And wondered if travel leads them anywhere – Horizons keep the soft line of your cheek, The windy sky’s a locket for your hair."

Then, of course, I was wishing someone was feeling that about me. Now I am old enough to have experienced the words from both sides. I am also happy to say that Leonard is still with us, still a hopeless romantic and I still have his picture (though no longer on my ceiling). Right now, I have James Taylor’s new version of Cohen’s "Suzanne" in the CD player in my car (I so love what Taylor does with those lyrics – just listen to him sing the word "China" as in tea – he’s just amazing) and now that I’ve gotten Cohen’s "Selected Poems" off my shelf to answer this post, I am walking down memory lane: Ah, "the mortal ring of flesh on flesh in dark."

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Not sure where I heard this but I’ve shaped my life around it.

"To the world you might be one person but to one person you might be the world."

By Robin Brown on 08/17/2009 5:45 pm

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Love as thou wilt

from Jacqueline Carey’s Kushiel’s Legacy. Kushiel’s Dart, Kushiel’s Chosen and Kushiel’s Avatar.

By Rebecca G on 08/17/2009 5:47 pm

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One poem that never fails to touch my heart is this, from Nicholas Campbell’s 1993 volume, "Dandelion Clocks."

Learning to Fly

Sometimes you have to go
far out on a limb for the fruit.
You’re afraid, maybe, but then
you love the world so much
you’re willing to fall.

Once I reached that limb.
High over a yard, up where
I’d never gone. I wouldn’t listen.
When someone said, "Come down,
"I said it was for love.

"You’d better hold on," they said,
but I didn’t hear a thing,
not even when she said, "I don’t love you,"
I climbed out where love said,
"Do it for me," until I was flying.

By Dee Santos on 08/17/2009 6:11 pm

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When I was a young child, from the musical Gypsy: "Little lamb, little lamb - I wonder how old I am."

As a tomboy child, from the movie based on Harper Lee’s book To Kill A Mockingbird and the portrayal of Scout: "Hey Mr. Cunningham!"

A young adolescent reading Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre for the first time: Chapter 23

Re-reading Jane Eyre in college: "I am formed for labour — not for love."

Alistair MacLean’s H.M.S. Ulysses, character Captain Vallery.

Jean M. Auel’s The Valley of Horses, character Ayla at her cave.

Keeping me company as I drive, the poetry of Emily Dickinson: "To pile like thunder to its close. Then crumble grand away while everything created hid. This would be Poetry — or Love. The two coeval come. We both and neither prove. Experience either —and consume. For none see God and live."

Reading Jane Eyre again with my forty year old eyes: "Is it you, is it Jane? You are come back to me then?"

The love poems of Nazir Q alway draws my dearest Frank into my heart’s infinity.

By Hines Hammond on 08/17/2009 8:18 pm

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I have several quotes that I like, but this is one of my favorites. "What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Ralph Waldo Emerson

By Lisa Reedy on 08/17/2009 8:24 pm

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Lisa Reedy - I do so admire and love many of the sayings and writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. The one you have chosen is quite beautiful. I would like to ride on your choice and submit a special favourite I have from this great author. I am certain you have read it also. It is the following:

"Success: To laugh often and much, to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children, to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends, to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded!"
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

By Lauriate Roly on 08/17/2009 8:38 pm

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Amen, Lauriate, and thank you!

By Green Tears on 08/17/2009 8:50 pm

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Lauriate … I used to remember this Emerson quote as it said all that needs be said … and then it was you who recalled it. Interesting. By the way, at the top of the page with the penguin we saw in Antarctica in January, my daughter is making one of her rare visits. She is beyond bright - but you might guess from her choices. Joan

By joan larsen on 08/18/2009 9:46 pm

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Joan Larsen - How truly amazing. I had studied and re-read the quotations alongside the penguin several times before receiving your exciting message and even made a mental note to remember the name Hines Hammond. An overwhelming selection chosen by someone obviously beyond just bright. So bright that I could not escape the lure from a radiance which shines like the enchanting mother. Thank you for pointing out and explaining why I was so attracted by the depth of the comment. Perhaps we will see more of the penguin while the visit continues? (Larsen, you are full of surprises. Such a woman you are)!

By Lauriate Roly on 08/19/2009 2:26 am

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Do you remember Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth? With a child with so many talents, interests so diverse, and daredevil enough to jump into the Antarctic ocean in January to find out what "real cold" felt like, you might know that her interest in that story was strong enough that we hired a small plane in Iceland to go Verne’s source, the top of the volcano of Mt. Sneffels to see the entrance first hand. And Lauriate, I have a small feeling that you might enjoy beyond words being around those who are keen to be the first, drawn to learn more. And then more. We all believe that we never stop learning, never stop growing, but Debra happens to have the abilities to do it better than most. Oh - a further connection - Deb was the one who climbed with the guide to the top of the mountain across from Denali in Alaska and actually took the photo of the grizzly making his approach to me below . . but she was a mile up. But she has had her own grizzly encounters that would most likely scare you also. Full of surprises, Lauriate??? We wouldn’t want life to be dull, would we????? Never.

By joan larsen on 08/19/2009 4:49 am

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Jules Verne is long past the “in waiting “ shelf, but I will attempt to look further and try to retrieve Journey to the Centre of the Earth to review those adventurous chapters.

How very interesting, and I’m confused by the name Debra. The signature under the penguin is Hines Hammond. Nom-de-plume, I presume? (good rhyme)?

Dull ? Not bloody likely.

By Lauriate Roly on 08/19/2009 7:37 am

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Well, Lauriate, you’re a poet and don’t know it (poor rhyme but good try???? please). And Debra does not inform me of her non de plume or why - a private secret I presume. And I don’t know about you, but I like secrets … But while she was active a year or more ago, her life has taken a change that has been all time-and-emotion consuming, and she hopefully is just about to "come around" again. I hope, I hope. What I do know is that you will give up looking for Larsen and start looking for her incredibly fascinating and intelligent daughter - that part I promise. "She walks in beauty" - and isn’t that a quote???

Joan

By joan larsen on 08/19/2009 9:26 am

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1. " If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal" 1 Corinthians 13

2. ‘You hypocrite. first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye" Matthew 7:5

3. "Yes, I came in here alone, and yes, I’ve had a few, but I’ll be damned if I’ll go home with a wild turkey like you." Lacy J. Dalton (I assume Lacy J.Dalton wrote it, but I really don’t know for sure)

By Sally K on 08/17/2009 8:46 pm

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I have a sentence by my computer desk I see all the time but sadly I dont always follow it. "The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for."

By Holly Kemman on 08/17/2009 10:14 pm

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Holly, Great quote! I’m going to print it out and keep it by my computer as well. I lost my job in April and have been having little luck getting a new one…I have considered taking "just any job" even if it’s not what I want to do. This quote will remind me that settling for something is not always the best answer.

By Lori Sysel on 08/18/2009 9:51 am