Rubem Quotes & Sayings

...do you like to write?"

"No. No writer really likes to write. I like to make love and drink wine. At my age I shouldn't lose time with anything else, but I can't stop writing. It's a disease. — Rubem Fonseca

The most compelling narrative, expressed in sentences with which I have no chemical reaction, or an adverse one, leaves me cold. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Doomsday is quite within our reach, if we will only stretch for it. — Loudon Wainwright III

What are you giving him?"
She grins smugly. "Only the greatest gift a woman can give the man she loves."
I take my best guess. "Anal?"
Kate covers her eyes.
Dee-Dee's smile turns into a scowl. "No
pig. I'm giving him the gift of health. My acupuncturist cleared her schedule. She's going to work on Matthew the whole day."
I laugh. Because this explains so much.
"That's your gift? Really? It's the guy's birthday and you're gonna make him get needles stuck in his face all day? What are you gonna get him for Christmas - a colonoscopy? — Emma Chase

I think both Protestants and Catholics have killed the woman for the sake of the mother. (Rubem Alves, p. 201) — Mev Puleo

Always think of drawing, getting the forms realized, emphasizing the design. — John French Sloan

They sat quietly together for a few minutes, Joe holding Fiona's hand, Fiona sniffling. No flowery words, no platitudes passed between them. Joe would have done anything to ease her suffering, but he knew nothing he might do, or say, could. Her grief would run its course, like a fever, and release her when it was spent. He would not shush her or tell her it was God's will and that her da was better off. That was rubbish and they both knew it. When something hurt as bad as this, you had to let it hurt. There were no shortcuts. — Jennifer Donnelly

There is a total incompatibility between the joy of reading, a vagabond experience, and the experience of reading in order to answer questions, and explain what you understood. — Rubem Alves

I don't tolerate politics that come from anger. I want a politics derived from beauty ... I don't admire politicians, but poets. (Rubem Alves, p. 189) — Mev Puleo

Let us plant dates even though those who plant them will never eat them. We must live by the love of what we will never see. — Rubem Alves

Hope is hearing the music of the future. Faith is to dance to it. — Rubem Alves

We are all part of the same energy that envelops. — Persis Khambatta

It would annoy me to be killed by someone who doesn't especially hate me as an individual, or who I didn't personally betray. — Steve Toltz

Dicky was intelligent but he ended up selling tea because he was socially retarded. — Johnny B. Truant

For one thing, she pronounced flowers 'flars' and I couldn't let it slide. — James Thurber

Stress comes from unknown fear. To reduce stress, love what you do and be who you are. — Debasish Mridha

I was twelve, after all, an age at which kids are bewildered and amorphous, transforming overnight, no matter how stable their lives are; — Tana French

I believe that theology is facing the abyss.
I must face the abyss, the abyss of existence, the abyss of mystery. (Rubem Alves, p. 189) — Mev Puleo

I broke with the academic style because I decided that life is very short, very mysterious, and I didn't have the time to waste with academics. I would only say things in the most honesty manner. If people like it, fine. If not, I can't help that. Today I couldn't write academically even if I wanted to! (Rubem Alves, p. 188) — Mev Puleo

When you break into song, it's not about dialogue, it's not about how you would speak in a naturalistic sense-it's about expressing your inner torment or your inner joy. — Julie Taymor

There is no conflict between best in British class and being a global newspaper. We are an international newspaper rooted in the City of London, and I think people understand that. The 'FT' stands out as a global niche product. — Lionel Barber

But a Congolese life is like the useless Congolese bill, which you can pile by the fistful or the bucketful into a merchant's hand, and still not purchase a single banana. It's dawning on me that I live among men and women who've simply always understood their whole existence is worth less than a banana to most white people. I see it in their eyes when they glance up at me. — Barbara Kingsolver