Narrowing Quotes & Sayings

Times were changing in the world of id. They had finally fired Jason, narrowing the group to Carmack, Romero, Adrian, and Tom. But something else was in the air. The Reagan-Bush era was finally coming to a close and a new spirit rising. It began in Seattle, where a sloppily dressed grunge rock trio called Nirvana ousted Michael Jackson from the top of the pop charts with their album Nevermind. Soon grunge and hip-hop were dominating the world with more brutal and honest views. Id was braced to do for games what those artists had done for music: overthrow the status quo. Games until this point had been ruled by their own equivalent of pop, in the form of Mario and Pac-Man. Unlike music, the software industry had never experienced anything as rebellious as Wolfenstein 3-D. The — David Kushner

It's the minute fanaticism and superiority of the Almanach that offends: the chilling and narrowing of the kinship tie into something denatured and artificial. — Christopher Hitchens

We're all broken. We all have cracks. It's not about making it through life in one piece it's about narrowing the gap between the fissures so we don't shatter."
Ted Basel to Jo Nehr in my next "Surrender" story — Riley Murphy

This is the staff sergeant coming out," Kelly told Hagan quietly. "I'm used to it."
Hagan looked him up and down, narrowing his eyes. "You come like a fire hose when he gives you an order, don't you?"
"Only if he tells me to," Kelly countered with a smirk. — Abigail Roux

With fantasy, one often has to think of a well-loved series before narrowing the selection to a favourite book. So it is with Zelazny. I've read his 'Princes in Amber' books so often, I know them almost verbatim, so much so that I am now trying to forget them so I can return to them with renewed pleasure. — Neal Asher

Professor Ramachandran believes this synesthetic connection between our hearing and seeing senses was an important first step towards the creation of words in early humans. According to this theory, our ancestors would have begun to talk by using sounds that evoked the object they wanted to describe. For example, words referring to something small often involve making a synesthetic small i sound with the lips and a narrowing of the vocal tracts: Little, teeny, petite, whereas the opposite is true of words denoting something large or enormous. If the theory is right, then language emerged from the vast array of synesthetic connections in the human brain. — Daniel Tammet

The more closely [the German army] converged on [Stalingrad], the narrower became their scope for tactical manoeuvre as a lever in loosening resistance. By contrast, the narrowing of the frontage made it easier for the defender to switch his local reserves to any threatened point on the defensive arc. — B.H. Liddell Hart

At least twice a week, I pause in the rush of work and have a meeting with myself. (If I were part of a team, I'd call a team meeting.) I ask myself, again, of the project: "What is this damn thing about?" Keep refining your understanding of the theme; keep narrowing it down. — Steven Pressfield

It's not about electing the right people. It's about a narrowing their responsibilities. — John Stossel

The funnel of my family's salvation must continue narrowing towards the gallows. That journey cannot begin at the parted tips of another woman's toes — Taona Dumisani Chiveneko

Hmm?" She raised her eyebrows and looked up at him, then her cheerful expression faded. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?" he asked, though he knew damned well what she meant.
"Like ye think I'd be willing to have my wedding night lying in the dirt," she said, narrowing her eyes at him. "If ye believe that, you're quite mistaken."
"So we're only debating where, and not whether, to have a wedding night?" he asked. — Margaret Mallory

The closer we are to God, to divine attributes - such as absolute truth, goodness, and beauty - the more we wonder. When we separate ourselves from truth, goodness, and beauty, we lose wonder and become cynical. The Enlightenment was basically the narrowing of our vision to a purely scientific, empirical, rationalistic worldview, screwing down the manhole covers on us so we became squinting underground creatures. — Peter Kreeft

Will's Father's gaze went immediately to Gabriel, and then to Cecily, his eyes narrowing.
"And who is this gentlemen?"
Will's grin widened.
"Oh him," he said. "This is Cecliy's friend, Mr. Gabriel Lightworm."
Gabriel, half in the act of stretching his hand to greet Mr. Herondale, froze in horror.
"Lightwood," he sputtered. "Gabriel Lightwood. — Cassandra Clare

Up and away for life! be fleet!-
The frost-king ties my fumbling feet,
Sings in my ears, my hands are stones,
Curdles the blood to the marble bones,
Tugs at the heart-strings, numbs the sense,
And hems in life with narrowing fence.
Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep,-
The punctual stars will vigil keep,-
Embalmed by purifying cold;
The winds shall sing their dead-march old,
The snow is no ignoble shroud,
The moon thy mourner, and the cloud. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

I really wondered why people were always doing what they didn't like doing. It seemed like life was a sort of narrowing tunnel. Right when you were born, the tunnel was huge. You could be anything. Then, like, the absolute second after you were born, the tunnel narrowed down to about half that size. You were a boy, and already it was certain you wouldn't be a mother and it was likely you wouldn't become a manicurist or a kindergarten teacher. Then you started to grow up and everything you did closed the tunnel in some more. You broke your arm climbing a tree and you ruled out being a baseball pitcher. You failed every math test you ever took and you canceled any hope of being a scientist. Like that. On and on through the years until you were stuck. You'd become a baker or a librarian or a bartender. Or an accountant. And there you were. I figured that on the day you died, the tunnel would be so narrow, you'd have squeezed yourself in with so many choices, that you just got squashed. — Carol Rifka Brunt

This much I knew and know: I was making myself hideously uncomfortable by not narrowing my attention to details of life which were immediately important, and by refusing to believe what my neighbors believed. — Kurt Vonnegut

Razor noticed. "You know him," he said, narrowing his eyes.
I nodded.
He arched a brow. "Hmm ... know him or know-know him?"
"That's none of your business," I snapped. — Ada Adams

A capitalist society requires a culture based on images. It needs to furnish vast amounts of entertainment in order to stimulate buying and anesthetise the injuries of class, race, and sex. And it needs to gather unlimited amounts of information, the better to exploit natural resources, increase productivity, keep order, make war, give jobs to bureaucrats. The camera's twin capacities, to subjectivise reality and to objectify it, ideally serve these needs as strengthen them. Cameras define reality in the two ways essential to the workings of an advanced industrial society: as a spectacle (for masses) and as an object of surveillance (for rulers). The production of images also furnishes a ruling ideology. Social change is replaced by a change in images. The freedom to consume a plurality of images and goods is equated with freedom itself. The narrowing of free political choice to free economic consumption requires the unlimited production and consumption of images. — Susan Sontag

We should free ourselves from the narrowness of being related only to those familiar to us, either by the fact that they are blood relations or, in a larger sense, that we eat the same food, speak the same language, and have the same " common sense." Knowing men in the sense of compassionate and empathetic knowledge requires that we get rid of the narrowing ties of a given society, race or culture and penetrate to the depth of that human reality in which we are all nothing but human. True compassion and knowledge of man has been largely underrated as a revolutionary factor in the development of man, just as art has been. It is a noteworthy phenomenon that in the development of capitalism and its ethics, compassion (or mercy) ceases to be a virtue. — Erich Fromm

But as I stood watching her, I realized how truly hard it was,really, to see someone you love change right before your eyes. Not only is it scary, it throws your balance off as well. This was how my mother felt, I realized, over the weeks I worked at Wish, as she began to not recognize me in small ways, day after day. It was no wonder she'd reacted by pulling me closer, frcibly narrowing my world back to fit insider her own. Even now, as I finally saw this as the truth it was, a part of me wishing my mother would stand up straight, take command, be back in control. But all I'd wanted when she was tugging me closer was to be able to prove to her that the changes in me were good ones, ones she'd understand if she only gave them a chance. I had that chance now. While it was scary, I was gong to take it.
~Macy, pgs 351 and 352 — Sarah Dessen

Tavish could tell he was being sized up. And by the narrowing of Joseph's eyes, he recognized Tavish's intent as well. They stood, eyeing one another for several long and silent moments. Tavish had not intended to pursue Katie in the least. Now, it seemed, he had a rival. Joseph Archer was infuriatingly difficult to read. Was it confidence that kept him so at ease? Joseph did have the advantage. Katie lived in his house. He could see her, talk to her every day. Joseph was wealthy, with the air of class and money about him. Tavish had none of those things. And though Katie had warmed to him a bit, he didn't yet feel she'd entirely shed her wariness of him. — Sarah M. Eden

This, then, is the dread that seems to lie beneath the fear of equalizing. Equity is seen as dispossession. Local autonomy is seen as liberty
even if the poverty of those in nearby cities robs them o fall meaningful autonomy by narrowing their choices to the meanest and the shabbiest of options. In this way, defendants in these cases seem to polarize two of the principles that lie close to the origins of this republic. Liberty and equity are seen as antibodies to each other. — Jonathan Kozol

Jase took a step around the desk, moving closer, narrowing his eyes.
Rebecca placed her hands on her hips, defiance in her stance and voice. "My kids, too."
Two steps brought him in front of her. "You don't have a job if you leave. Your job is here working the ranch with me. If you want to go, go, but don't take off with my children. You can't even fix them dinner."
When she turned, he took hold of her arm, hating this deceit ... and loss. "Why, Rebecca? I've been a good husband to you. — Mary J. McCoy-Dressel

Don't let another man, tight wearing fairy or not, help you out of your clothes again," he said, his eyes narrowing just enough to know some scalding emotions were firing through him right now. "If you need help out of so much as a sock, you call me, you got it? That's my job. — Nicole Williams

From the psychological point of view, the self-asserting emotions, derived from emergency reactions, involve a narrowing of consciousness; the participatory emotions an expansion of consciousness by identificatory processes of various kinds. — Arthur Koestler

Miss Kinsley regarded him with the look of disgust girls reserved for snails and frogs. "Any man who would suggest to a young woman that she should elope rather than listen to her papa's advice can only be up to no good."
"Elope?" Oliver queried, his eyes narrowing on Miss Kinsley. "This scoundrel proposed marriage to you?"
"Now, Miss Kinsley," Nathan began in his best placating voice, "we both know it wasn't like-"
"Quiet!" Oliver snapped at him. "Or I swear not even Maria will keep me from throttling you."
Nathan swallowed. Hard. — Sabrina Jeffries

MTV definitely has the effect of narrowing the range of music that hits the mainstream. On the other hand, isn't that the effect of television in general? — Ann Powers

But the biggest challenge overall was narrowing down the complex narrative elements into a clean and straightforward story while maintaining a sense of the cultural context that makes the film special. — Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy

Why do you have a blanket in your car?"
"In case I need it."
"Have you ever had sex on it?" I asked, staring at the soft plush material with narrowing eyes.
Ethan laughed, "Of course I have."
"Oh, I said, holding the material further away.
"It's my sex blanket. Whenever I'm int he mood, I just lay it on the ground, take off my clothes, and the ladies line up. — M.K. Schiller

Its face crinkled up grotesquely, the eyes narrowing like those of a laughing Buddha, the lips peeling back to expose a sickle of brilliant teeth. — Clive Barker

Global food insecurity is increasing ... the slim excess of growth in food production over population is narrowing. — Lester R. Brown

On the way over, however, it slid off the shovel and onto Henry's shoes.
Pity, that.
She whirled around. He waited for her to burst out with, "You did that on purpose!" but she kept silent, motionless except for a slight narrowing of her eyes. Then, with a flick of her ankle, the slop spattered onto his trousers.
She smirked, waiting for him to say, "You did that on purpose!" but he also remained silent. Then he smiled at her, and she knew she was in trouble. — Julia Quinn

Dee's hand fluttered around her as she spoke. "I was outside, and it looked as if a light show was going on in your bedroom. Daemon said you were probably mas - "
And Dee also knew no boundaries.
"Ah, no, please don't finish that sentence." He lowered his hands, eyes narrowing at his sister. "Don't ever finish that sentence. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

Well, well. If it isn't the princess."
My body tensed and I frowned when I saw him approaching. Narrowing my eyes, I plastered on a fake smile. "I almost didn't recognize you without a tramp attached to you."
Drew and the other guy snickered.
Leaning into my ear he harshly whispered, "Would you like to change that? I'm not up to my limit tonight yet."
Gah, why did he have to be so hot? My body was practically humming with how close he was. I leaned away and replied with the most innocent expression on my face, "Oh I'm sorry, but I don't have any STDs, I'm not your type. — Molly McAdams

He stills, and our eyes lock, his narrowing, holding mine captive. "Run to me, not from me. — Lisa Renee Jones

By denying people's sense of visual beauty in painting and sculpture , melody in music , meter and rhyme in poetry , plot and narrative and character in fiction , the elite arts wrote off the vast majority of their audience . They purposely excluded people who approach art in part for pleasure and edification in favour of social one-upmanship and an ever-narrowing, in-crowd elite. — Steven Pinker

If he'd been any other man and i'd been any other girl, I'd have called the narrowing of his heavy-lidded dark eyes lust. But he was Barrons and I was Mac, and a blossoming of lust was about as likely as orchids blooming in Antarctica — Karen Marie Moning

I stared at her. "But she drugged us."
"That is no longer news, dumbass. Are you going to ask why she drugged you?"
"Allright," I said, narrowing my eyes. "Why?"
"Because, dear October, you're the most passively suicidal person I've ever met, and that's saying something. You'll never open your wrists, but you'll run headfirst into hell. You'll have good reasons. You'll have great reasons, even. And a part of you will be praying that you won't come out again. — Seanan McGuire

Do I have clueless tattooed across my forehead?"
Narrowing my eyes,I leaned toward him. "Yeah,I think maybe you do. — Rachel Hawthorne

I can see television much more easily than I can see features, because the economy and politics of making big, big features seems to me to be narrowing even from what it was. — William Gibson

Every man carries about him a touchstone, if he will make use of it, to distinguish substantial gold from superficial glitterings, truth from appearances. And indeed the use and benefit of this touchstone, which is natural reason, is spoiled and lost only by assumed prejudices, overweening presumption, and narrowing our minds. — John Locke

By now, the corporations that dominate our media, like alcoholic fat cats, treat this situation as theirs by right ... Their concept of a diversity of views is the full range of politics and social values from center to far right. The American audience, having been exposed to a narrowing range of ideas over the decades, often assumes that what they see and hear in the major media is all there is. It is no way to maintain a lively marketplace of ideas, which is to say it is no way to maintain a democracy. — Ben Bagdikian

Don't sport it unless you plan to use it. Raven stuck his tongue out, his eyes narrowing with intention. The ring on his lip protruded out. — C.L.Stone

So initiate us," Claire said, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes in challenge. "Make us priests and priestesses of Apollo."
"Say that again," Jason said, turning to Claire. He was so stunned there was almost no expression on his face.
"That's the plan you've been working on for the past two days? The one you told us not to worry about?" Matt asked in an increasingly high-pitched voice.
"Yup. — Josephine Angelini

Cabrero, kayla said, narrowing her eyes at Alex. If you do that one more time, I will take this book from you and hit you with it till you're dead. Again. — Meg Cabot

She leaned forward, looking utterly inhuman, and I fought the urge to run screaming from the throne room. "I have heard of your exploits, Meghan Chase, " the queen rasped, narrowing her eyes. "Did you not think I would find out? You tricked a prince of the Unseelie Court into following you into the Iron Realm. You made him fight your enemies for you. You bound him to a contract that nearly killed him. My precious boy, almost lost to me forever, because of you. How do you think that makes me feel?" Mab's smile grew more predatory, as my stomach twisted in fear. — Julie Kagawa

Hi!" she said, a bit louder than she meant to. Ian raised one eyebrow and Amy felt the beginnings of a blush. She started to give Ian a hug, but he had already bent forward to kiss her on the cheek. Her sudden movement three him off, and they ended up bumping foreheads.
"Sorry," Amy said, turning away so Ian wouldn't see that her face had turned bright red.
"Quite all right. I had forgotten you do things differently across the pond." He took a step back to look at Amy. "I take it jeans are the latest in evening wear here in the wild west?" He made an exaggerated show of narrowing her eyes. "Is that a juice stain on your blouse? How fetching. — Clifford Riley

What is always needed in the appreciation of art, or life, is the larger perspective. Connections made, or at least attempted, where none existed before, the straining to encompass in one's glance at the varied world the common thread, the unifying theme through immense diversity, a fearlessness of growth, of search, of looking, that enlarges the private and the public world. And yet, in our particular society, it is the narrowed and narrowing view of life that often wins — Alice Walker

Without warning, Wesley lifted me up onto the pool table. His hands moved to my shoulders, and a second later, I was flat on my back, staring up at him as he smirked. He shifted so that he was on the table too, leaning over me with his face only inches from mine.
"On the pool table?" I said, narrowing my eyes at him. "Seriously?"
"I can't resist," he said. "You know, you're pretty sexy when you're pissed at me, Duffy."
First, I was struck by the irony of that statement. I mean, he used sexy and Duffy-implying I was fat and ugly-in the same sentence. The contrast was almost laughable. Almost. — Kody Keplinger

Jack, who apparently always had to be moving in some way, had made up for the missing knife by grabbing a half loaf of French bread and methodically ripping it into tiny pieces.
"What," I said, narrowing my eyes. "Why don't faeries like bread?"
"Hmm?" Jack looked up, then shrugged. "I dunno."
Lend picked up a piece, crumbling it. "My dad said he thought it was because it was the staff of life for people."
"Nasty stuff tastes like mold," Jack said. "I tried a piece once a while ago when I was still trying to force myself to eat normal food so I could stay here. It was like a shock to my whole system." He shuddered at the memory. — Kiersten White

Every serious scientific worker is painfully conscious of this involuntary relegation to an ever-narrowing sphere of knowledge, which threatens to deprive the investigator of his broad horizon and degrades him to the level of a mechanic. — Albert Einstein

Self-organization is often sacrificed for purposes of short-term productivity and stability. Productivity and stability are the usual excuses for turning creative human beings into mechanical adjuncts to production processes. Or for narrowing the genetic variability of crop plants. Or for establishing bureaucracies and theories of knowledge that treat people as if they were only numbers. — Donella H. Meadows

She slapped him, quick and hard. His head turned slightly with the blow, but other than that his only reaction was the narrowing of his eyes. Her chest was heaving as if she were running. "No! You must go to London. You must get him out. You must save my brother because if you don't, I swear upon everything I hold holy that I'll ruin both you and your illustrious name. I'll - " "Little bitch," he breathed, his face turned fiery red, and he slammed his mouth against hers. There was no softness in him. He claimed her lips like a marauder: hard and angry. If she'd once thought him cold as ice, well, that ice was burned away now by the fire of his rage. — Elizabeth Hoyt

If you're part of the Network Generation, you don't have to belong just to one nation. Dual identities come easily to these dual screeners. They fear a separate Scotland would be a narrowing, not a broadening, experience. — Douglas Alexander

Societies and people that come close to being happy are those that do well in narrowing the disparity between their desires and their needs, especially the material things of life. — Janvier Chouteu-Chando

You are more likely to acquire power by narrowing your focus and applying your energies, like the sun's rays, to a limited range of activities in a small number of domains. — Jeffrey Pfeffer

The methodological benefits of functional languages are well known [Bac78, Hug89, HJ94], but still the vast majority of programs are written in imperative languages such as C. This apparent contradiction is easily explained by the fact that functional languages have historically been slower than their more traditional cousins, but this gap is narrowing. — Chris Okasaki

Now individual consciousness, as typified in human beings, has great advantages and great disadvantages. Individuality means a narrowing, and narrowness can be useful. It is good for close-up work. We have invented the magnifying glass and the microscope to narrow our vision, because narrowness makes for precision. But narrowness also makes for a failure of purpose, for exhaustion of the will; for purpose depends upon a broad vision, a clear sight of one's objective. — Colin Wilson

I killed you," Sin said finally, his voice low and shaking with anger.
Emilio looked genuinely confused now and he gave Sin a bizarre look. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Sin shook his head slowly, incredulously, eyes narrowing into slits. "I fucking shot you, and you fucking died!" he shouted finally, taking a menacing step towards his father.
But Emilio didn't back down, he just shrugged calmly at the younger reflection of himself. "Oh, that. — Ais

The ironic thing about the narrowing-down of neurosis is that the person seeks to avoid death, but he does it by killing off so much of himself and so large a spectrum of his action-world that he is actually isolating and diminishing himself and becomes as though dead.10 There is just no way for the living creature to avoid life and death, and it is probably poetic justice that if he tries too hard to do so he destroys himself. — Ernest Becker

Wait a minute - who is Mrs. Alexander Banks eight thousand and twenty-one?"
Uh-oh. He'd spotted the small icon at the top with my log-in name. I felt my face heat up. "It's just, uh, a name. Everyone has to log in under a made-up name."
He turned to me, narrowing his eyes. "Is this your made-up name? — Allison Van Diepen

With every choice, even the choice of inactivity, we must shut the door to a host of alternate futures. Each step we take along the path of fate represents a narrowing of potential, the death of a parallel world. The path of fate was more like a tunnel, and it was constricting about her with ever step she took. — Michael David Lukas

Minutes pass, and between the minutes, June is slashing out the possibilities. She is narrowing her sister's life down to its essentials. The first to go is the vet's office where May might have worked, which is a loss, but the next to go is the mansion that May has been inside of in her dreams, a terrible, vast, cold place where the pictures are old and of other families. And so it is a relief to see it go, slashed out, burned to the ground with the hot friction of June's pencil. Then there is the loss of all possible sons, which is a tremendous relief, and then the crossing out of husbands, one by one, save one. — Emily Ruskovich

Do I look like I've been crying?' I say.
'Hmm.' He leans in close, narrowing his eyes like he's inspecting my face. A smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. Even closer, so we would be breathng the same air- if I could remember to breathe.
'No, Tris,' he says. A more serious look replaces his smile as he adds, 'You look tough as nails. — Veronica Roth

Ranger shrugged. "Things turn up." He reached behind him and came up with a gun. My gun. "Found this in the lobby, too." He tucked the gun under the top edge of my towel, wedging it between my breasts, his knuckles brushing against me. My breath caught in my throat, and for a moment I thought my towel might catch fire. Ranger smiled again. And I did more eye narrowing. "I'll be in touch," Ranger said. And then he was gone. — Janet Evanovich

We can fight about it until Branson hears us, or we can get him together quietly," I went on, narrowing my eyes. "Your choice."
The high-arched portico covering the fortress's main entrance suddenly exploded, jetting out fire and pieces of stone. I ducked from instinct, but Vlad walked right toward the burning chaos, the fire parting to let him pass.
"Does that answer your question?" he asked. — Jeaniene Frost

O remember
In your narrowing dark hours
That more things move
Than blood in the heart. — Louise Bogan

The startup's goal is to find a profitable customer acquisition strategy by spending small amounts of money in a lot of them, measuring results, and then narrowing down the best channels, while performing PDCA for continuous improvement. — Francisco S. Homem De Mello

In a way I do hate the process of writing. It's like learning a role where you never think you're going to be able to conquer it when you start and it just takes enough focus and narrowing and getting enthusiastic and not losing it and so on. It's never good enough, but you aim for something and you hope it comes somewhat close. But it is a pleasure once you have written it. — Julie Andrews

My eyes shifted to the trickling river. Come spring, it would be ten times as wide and just as deep. On and on it went, rushing toward the distant horizon. Like time. Like life. Sometimes gently falling from one pool into the other, other times fast and cascading, and still other times narrowing into a funnel, a torrent of knots and waves. — Lisa Tawn Bergren

It became clear I wanted to be a development economist. I mean, I said I wanted to work on the economics of poor countries. And I'd actually say that I don't think that was so much about narrowing the gap as about increasing their incomes, which means economic growth, which is really my prime interest. — James Mirrlees

Overemphasis on the sex aspect of morality has led to a neglect of its other aspects and a narrowing of its range. — Corliss Lamont

I have a hard time narrowing things down to ten or 12 songs. If I walk off stage in anything less than two hours, it just feels strange. It feels early. — Chris Cornell

A complete sharing between two people is an impossibility and whenever it seems, nevertheless, to exist, it is a narrowing, a mutual agreement which robs either one member or both of his fullest freedom and development. But, once the realization is accepted that, even between the closest human beings, infinite distances continue to exist, a wonderful living side by side can grow up, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole and against a wide sky! — Rainer Maria Rilke

Narrowing her eyes, Jocasta ground her teeth together and stalked toward the source of the magic. Her walking stick thudded against the ground in time with her step. She drew her cloak about her bony shoulders, huddling into it against the chill of the late October air. Her bones were too old to be traipsing about at this hour of the night, but that was what came of being the head of the SALEM Council. — Violet Merriweather

You're going to stop distracting me while I drive," he said and there was no humor in his voice. "Do you understand?"
"Jeans tight?" I asked, daring him.
Judd narrowed his eyes at me in a rather scary way. Instead of shirking away from him, I remembered how it was his job to get me to Ellsberg safely. Narrowing my eyes, I glared right back at him. We held those angry gazes for a few minutes then he grinned.
"Yes," he said, answering my question as he stared at the now moving traffic. "So shut up, will ya? — Bijou Hunter

Mom told me that love is like a seed. You've got to plant it to grow. But that's not all. You need to water it. The sun needs to shine enough, but not too much. The roots have to take hold," he continued, narrowing his eyes in concentration. "And from there, if it pops its head above the surface, there are about a million things that could kill it, so it takes a whole lot of luck too. — Nicole Williams

We think we understand the rules when we become adults but what we really experience is a narrowing of the imagination. — David Lynch

Prince Bolkonsky was of medium height, a rather handsome young man with well-defined and dry features. Everything in his figure, from his weary, bored gaze to his quiet, measured gait, presented the sharpest contrast with his small, lively wife. Obviously, he not only knew everyone in the drawing room, but was also so sick of them that it was very boring for him to look at them and listen to them. Of all the faces he found so boring, the face of his pretty wife seemed to be the one he was most sick of. With a grimace that spoiled his handsome face, he turned away from her. He kissed Anna Pavlovna's hand and, narrowing his eyes, looked around at the whole company. — Leo Tolstoy

The ownership of land is an odd thing when you come to think of it. How deep, after all, can it go? If a person owns a piece of land, does he own it all the way down, in ever narrowing dimensions, till it meets all other pieces at the center of the earth? Or does ownership consist only of a thin crust under which the friendly worms have never heard of trespassing? — Natalie Babbitt

In general, I don't like to blame the creators. They are making work that appeals to them and the people in the room with them. They are making something that is, at some level, genuine. But the distributors, the networks that bring art to the population, they are the ones who ensure that there's a flattening and narrowing. The younger me may have sat up all night with bandmates raging against Puffy or DMX or whoever, but the fact is that they were never the problem. The problem was that someone in the corporate chain of command felt that there was a need to play those songs fourteen times a day and to eliminate alternatives. — Ahmir Questlove Thompson

How unfortunate and how narrowing a thing it is for a man to have wealth who makes a god of it instead of a servant — Mark Twain

Did you catch the time-of-great-suffering thing?"
Her expression softened. "Can you just make sure I'm not around when it happens?"
"No can do," I said, strolling back to my office with a negating wave of my hand. "If I have to suffer, then so does everyone else within a ten-mile radius."
She pursed her lips. "What ever happened to taking one for the team?"
"Was never much of a team player."
"Sacrificing yourself for the greater good?"
"Not that into human sacrifice."
"Suffering in silence?"
I stopped and turned back to her, my eyes narrowing accusingly. "If I have to suffer, I'll be screaming your name at the top of my lungs the whole time. You'll be able to hear me all the way to Jersey, mark my words."
- Charley to Cookie — Darynda Jones

I just know from experience that reading a funny poem aloud, especially at the beginning of a public reading, can have a certain effect. Somehow narrowing the spectrum of possible emotional reactions. So while I like it when people laugh at my poems, and I definitely enjoy being funny in them, I don't really think that's the most important thing that's going on, at least not to me. — Matthew Zapruder

Did you pray?" she asks.
"For the last time," I say, narrowing my kohl-lined black eyes at her, "I refuse to pray to my own parents. It's ridiculous. — Kiersten White

In these times, when so wide a gulf has opened between the rich and the poor, which, instead of narrowing, as all good men would have it, grows broader daily; it is most important that all ranks and degrees of people should understand whose hands are stretched out to separate these two great divisions of society each of whom, for its strength and happiness, and the future existence of this country, as a great and powerful nation, is dependent on the other. — Charles Dickens

I know how it is," Madame Appeline said, narrowing her slanting eyes slightly over her ice-cream smile. "There is a feeling deep down inside you, isn't there? All the time. It bothers you. You don't really know what it is, or how to describe it. You do not have a Face for it. And so you scan all the Face catalogues, and ask for Faces for every birthday because perhaps, just perhaps, if you had the right Face, you might understand what you are feeling. You need to find that Face." She leaned forward slightly. "Do go and look at our exhibition rooms, Miss Childersin. — Frances Hardinge

The habit of dwelling on the past, has a narrowing as well as a debilitating influence. Behind us, there is a small, - an almost insignificant measure of time; before us, there is an eternity. It is the natural tendency of the mind to magnify the one, and to diminish the other ... — Harriet Martineau

Mascara was dripping down her cheeks, splattering on her shirt. She backed away from him, eyes narrowing. Her shoes squished with the movement and, as she peered uncomprehendingly down at them, a tadpole emerged from the leg of her jeans and flopped about on the ground.
"Eem!She pointed a shaking finger at it. "A tadpole. I had a tadpole in my pants!"
"Lucky tadpole," he murmured.
-Adam and Gabrielle — Karen Marie Moning

Like resilience, self-organization is often sacrificed for purposes of short-term productivity and stability. Productivity and stability are the usual excuses for turning creative human beings into mechanical adjuncts to production processes. Or for narrowing the genetic variability of crop plants. Or for establishing bureaucracies and theories of knowledge that treat people as if they were only numbers. Self-organization — Donella H. Meadows

Man is not a 'fixed and limited animal whose nature is absolutely constant'. He changed drastically when he developed 'divided consciousness' to cope with complexities of civilisation, and has been changing steadily ever since. His greatest problem, the problem that has caused most of his agonies and miseries, has been his attempt to compensate for the narrowing of cinsciousness and the entrapment in the left-brain ego. His favorite method of compensation has been to seek out excitement. He feels most free in moments of conquest; so for the past three thousand years or so, most of the greatest man have led armies into their neighbours' territority, and turned order into chaos. This has plainly been a retrogressive step; the evolutionary urge has been defeating its own purpose. — Colin Wilson

There is a little narrowing to his eyes at the end of it that makes me understand that this is a test. Whether or not I'm brave enough to go into the stall with Corr after yesterday morning, after I've had time to think about what happened. The thought of it makes my pulse trip. The question is not if I trust Corr. The question is if I trust Sean. — Maggie Stiefvater

Why are you here, Eduardo?' Dom persisted.
The Angel's face creased and showed signs of the broken man Dom had known yesterday. It passed and was replaced by a slight narrowing of the eyes. Sparks. Dom realised that something had shifted. Not physically perhaps, but emotionally. Eduardo's eyes grew darker with every moment. Angry Angel. Dominic wasn't just another person to protect anymore. — Lynnette Lounsbury

Well, a deficit reflects an imbalance between spending and revenue, and so narrowing it requires acting on one, the other or both. — Peter Orszag

In some ways, my mother was right; a tree does look the same from the top as it does from the bottom: same branches, starting as weighty limbs and narrowing to the tiniest twigs; same leaves, quivering in the slightest breeze or in the rush of the trains; same colors, same rustling, same gentle sway. But from earth, looking up, a tree is hopeful; it might be touching the sky. From above, looking down, you can see
it's stuck in the dust, just like us. — Elissa Janine Hoole

A crude way to put the whole thing is that our present culture is, both developmentally and historically, adolescent. And since adolescence is acknowledged to be the single most stressful and frightening period of human development
the stage when the adulthood we claim to crave begins to present itself as a real and narrowing system of responsibilities and limitations (taxes, death) and when we yearn inside for a return to the same childish oblivion we pretend to scorn
it's not difficult to see why we as a culture are so susceptible to art and entertainment whose primary function is escape, i. e. fantasy, adrenaline, spectacle, romance, etc. — David Foster Wallace

Bad habits are spiraling slides that drag you round and round down the narrowing end of a cone that eventually ends up in a dark, tight, confining spot.

Good habits are hooked wings that steadily grow in girth and strength. At first, they grasp and climb until those beautiful wings can lift the bearer out of the darkness and above the clouds to heights few ever experience. — Richelle E. Goodrich

The gaps are the thing. The gaps are the spirit's one home, the altitudes and latitudes so dazzlingly spare and clean that the spirit can discover itself like a once-blind man unbound. The gaps are the clefts in the rock where you cower to see the back parts of God; they are fissures between mountains and cells the wind lances through, the icy narrowing fiords splitting the cliffs of mystery. Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock - more than a maple - universe. — Annie Dillard

The classical heritage as shaped by and filtered through Roman culture had two great flaws. First, it prevented the very rich oral cultures of the ancient Mediterranean from surviving from antiquity into later times. All that was left as creative forces were Greek philosophy and Roman law. These were very substantial cultures but they represented a great narrowing of what could be passed on from antiquity to later centuries...
"Second, another deficiency of classical culture was its lack of social conscience, its obliviousness to the slavery, poverty, disease, and everyday cruelty endured by more than half of the fifty million people who inhabited the empire. The classical heritage represented a narrow and insensitive social and political theory reinforcing a miserably class-ridden and technologically stagnant society. — Norman F. Cantor

He [London] also wanted to warn her against befriending the young man."
"And did she stay away from him?" Steldor pressed, his eyes narrowing, and I suspected he already knew the answer. Destari wavered for an instant, reading Steldor's expression, but in the end answered straightforwardly.
"No, Your Majesty, she did not. — Cayla Kluver