Category Archives: quotes

criticism, quotes, wordage

I do not intend to define the term “thought”

In beginning to speak about the application of thought to textual criticism, I do not intend to define the term thought, because I hope that the sense which I attach to the word will emerge from what I say.

– A.E. Housman, “The Application of Thought to Textual Criticism,” Art & Error: Modern Textual Editing (ed. Ronald Gottesman and Scott Bennett)

How awesome is that? Awesome, right? If I went around like that, I wouldn’t ever have to define anything. “I do not intend to define the term “assonance,” because I hope that the sense which I attach to the word will emerge from what I say…”

I am being kind of facetious. Actually, I like it. And I think he gets away with it. And more:

In beginning to speak about the application of thought to textual criticism, I do not intend to define the term thought, because I hope that the sense which I attach to the word will emerge from what I say. But it is necessary at the outset to define textual criticism, because many people, and even some people who profess to teach it to others, do not know what it is. One sees books calling themselves introductions to textual criticism which contain nothing about textual criticism from beginning to end; which are all about paleography and manuscripts and collation, and have no more to do with textual criticism than if they were all about accidence and syntax. Palaeography is one of the things with which a textual critic needs to acquaint himself, but grammar is another, and equally indispensable; and no amount either of grammar or of palaeography will teach a man one scrap of textual criticism.”

His semicolons are so dashing. Oh, and how about that “no amount either of X or of Y”? Yes. You know you like it.

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quotes, the chorus

I don’t know why, I don’t know how,

but I know something’s starting right now…

– Ariel

I sent out a mass update to some friends of mine yesterday, about Poland, among other things. One of my oldest and dearest collaborators wrote back, saying, in effect, “I’m glad you’re feeling so inspired, cause I am having an inspiration deficiency.” Well, we talked, and now we have a project. I’ll say more when it is already happening.

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dialogue, quotes

it’s not even the pleasures of the flesh I’m talking about

I am reading more Philip Roth today: here is an excerpt from a fight about contraceptive devices.

She walked over to me, leaving white footprints on the grass. “I didn’t think you were such a creature of the flesh,” she said.

“Didn’t you?” I said. “I’ll tell you something that you ought to know. It’s not even the pleasures of the flesh I’m talking about.”

“Then, frankly, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Why you’re even bothering. Isn’t what we use sufficient?”

“I”m bothering just because I want you to go to a doctor and get a diaphragm. That’s all. No explanation. Just do it. Do it because I asked you to.”

“You’re not being reasonable – ”

“Goddamit, Brenda!”

“Goddamit yourself!” she said and went up into the house.

– Philip Roth, GOODBYE, COLUMBUS

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poetry, quotes

it is to poetry we must turn

If we want to know what it felt like to be alive at any given moment in the long odyssey of the race, it is to poetry we must turn.

– Stanley Kunitz, “Speaking Of Poetry,” from his 1994 commencement address at St. Mary’s college, Maryland, from the back of the Jan/Feb 09 APR

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poetry, quotes

he certainly should have done

Someone else said that he died of cirrhosis of the liver, the condition all poets kid one another about but never develop. I thought of checking that out, and then thought again. It seemed too apt, too poetic, to research into error. So let’s just say that, and leave it there. Let’s say he died of cirrhosis of the liver, and that if he didn’t he certainly should have done.

– “Youre Not The Outlaw You Think You Are,” Conor O’Callaghan eulogizing Michael Hartnett in the July/August 09 POETRY

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books, quotes

it’s Greek to me

The following is from THE SECRET HISTORY by Donna Tartt. I adore it, because I’ve started and withdrew/withdrew/C-minused ancient Greek three times, and I know just enough to be amused by the constructions. Also, it reminds me of the project I have about putting Molière into English but preserving French word order. Anyways. Fun.

“…Francis was so impatient with his happy news that he did not even wait for Tracy and Judy to leave the room but told me immediately, in sloppily inflected Greek, while sweet dopey Tracy wondered aloud at our wanting to keep up our schoolwork at a time like this.

“Do not fear,” he said to me. “It is the mother. She is concerned with the dishonor of the son having to do with wine.”

I did not understand what he meant. The form of “dishonor” (atimia) that he used also meant “loss of civil rights.” “Atimia?” I repeated.

“Yes.”

“But rights are for living men, not for the dead.”

“oimoi,” he said, shaking his head. “Oh, dear. No. No.”

He cast about, snapping his fingers, while Judy and Tracy looked on in interest. It is harder to carry on a conversation in a dead language than you might think. There has been much rumor,” he said at last. “The mother grieves. Not for her son,” he added hastily, when he saw I was about to speak, “for she is a wicked woman. Rather she grieves for the shame which has fallen on her house.”

“What shame is this?”

“(Greek),” he said impatiently. “(More Greek.) She seeks to show that his corpse does not hold wine” (and here he employed a very elegant and untranslatable metaphor: dregs in the empty wineskin of his body).

“And why, pray tell, does she care?”

“Because there is talk among the citizens. It is shameful for a young man to die while drunk.” ”

– THE SECRET HISTORY, Donna Tartt

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quotes

Oh, there ain’t no rest for the wicked…

…Money don’t grow on trees.
I got bills to pay,
I got mouths to feed,
There ain’t nothing in this world for free.
I know I can’t slow down,
I can’t hold back,
Though you know, I wish I could.
No there ain’t no rest for the wicked,
Until we close our eyes for good.

– “Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked,” Cage the Elephant from their self-titled CD

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quotes

you’re not done

That’s a good motto for all of us – find someone to be successful for. Rise to their hopes and their needs. As you think about life after graduation, as you look in the mirror tonight, you may see somebody with no idea what to do with their life. But a troubled child might look at you and see a mentor. A homebound senior citizen might see a lifeline. The folks at your local homeless shelter might see a friend. None of them care how much money is in your bank account, or whether you’re important at work, or famous around town – they just know that you’re someone who cares, someone who makes a difference in their lives.

That is what building a body of work is all about – it’s about the daily labor, the many individual acts, the choices large and small that add up to a lasting legacy. It’s about not being satisfied with the latest achievement, the latest gold star – because one thing I know about a body of work is that it’s never finished. It’s cumulative; it deepens and expands with each day that you give your best, and give back, and contribute to the life of this nation. You may have set-backs, and you may have failures, but you’re not done – not by a longshot.

– President Obama at ASU

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books, quotes

Nature may have done something

“But, perhaps, I keep no journal.”

“Perhaps you are not sitting in this room, and I am not sitting by you. Not keep a journal! How are your absent cousins to understand the tenour of your life in Bath without one? How are the civilities and compliments of every day to be related as they ought to be, unless noted down every evening in a journal? How are your various dresses to be remembered, and the particular state of your complexion, and curl of your hair to be described in all their diversities, without having constant recourse to a journal? My dear madam, I am not so ignorant of young ladies’ ways as you wish to believe me; it is this delightful habit of journalizing which largely contributes to form the easy style of writing for which ladies are so generally celebrated. Everybody allows that the talent of writing agreeable letters is peculiarly female. Nature may have done something, but I am sure it must be essentially assisted by the practice of keeping a journal.”

– Catherine Morland & Mr. Tilney, NORTHANGER ABBEY (Jane Austen)

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