Read through the most famous quotes by topic #bach
(Response to King Erik XIV of Sweden's proposal of marriage:) "[W]hile we perceive ... the zeal and love of your mind towards us is not diminished, yet in part we are grieved that we cannot gratify your Serene Highness with the same kind of affection. And that indeed does not happen because we doubt in any way of your love and honour, but, as often we have testified both in words and writing, that we have never yet conceived a feeling of that kind of affection towards anyone. We therefore beg your Serene Highness again and again that you be pleased to set a limit to your love, that it advance not beyond the laws of friendship for the present nor disregard them in the future. ... We certainly think that if God ever direct our hearts to consideration of marriage we shall never accept or choose any absent husband how powerful and wealthy a Prince soever. But that we are not to give you an answer until we have seen your person is so far from the thing itself that we never even considered such a thing. I have always given both to your brother ... and also to your ambassador likewise the same answer with scarcely any variation of the words, that we do not conceive in our heart to take a husband but highly commend this single life, and hope that your Serene Highness will no longer spend time in waiting for us. ↗
Oh well,' said Jack: and then, 'Did you ever meet Bach?' 'Which Bach?' 'London Bach.' 'Not I.' 'I did. He wrote some pieces for my uncle Fisher, and his young man copied them out fair. But they were lost years and years ago, so last time I was in town I went to see whether I could find the originals: the young man has set up on his own, having inherited his master's music-library. We searched through the papers — such a disorder you would hardly credit, and I had always supposed publishers were as neat as bees — we searched for hours, and no uncle's pieces did we find. But the whole point is this: Bach had a father.' 'Heavens, Jack, what things you tell me. Yet upon recollection I seem to have known other men in much the same case.' 'And this father, this old Bach, you understand me, had written piles and piles of musical scores in the pantry.' 'A whimsical place to compose in, perhaps; but then birds sing in trees, do they not? Why not antediluvian Germans in a pantry?' 'I mean the piles were kept in the pantry. Mice and blackbeetles and cook-maids had played Old Harry with some cantatas and a vast great passion according to St Mark, in High Dutch; but lower down all was well, and I brought away several pieces, 'cello for you, fiddle for me, and some for both together. It is strange stuff, fugues and suites of the last age, crabbed and knotted sometimes and not at all in the modern taste, but I do assure you, Stephen, there is meat in it. I have tried this partita in C a good many times, and the argument goes so deep, so close and deep, that I scarcely follow it yet, let alone make it sing. How I should love to hear it played really well — to hear Viotti dashing away. ↗
Xav sprinkled olive oil on his lettuce. 'Lola was very particular that it all had to fit properly.' 'Lola?' squeaked Diamond. I wanted to warn her not to rise to the bait Xav was dangling in front of her but it was too late. Xav added some Parmesan and pepper. 'Suspicious, Diamond? You should be. This is a bachelor party I'm organizing, not a school outing, and it is going to tick all of Trace's boxes. Lola is either a very efficient water sports instructor or an exotic dancing girl; I'll leave it your imagination.' I rolled my eyes at Diamond. 'Myabe she's both. I mean the guys will really go for that, I guess. Don't worry,Di, Luigi and his crew will not disappoint us girls.' Luigi was in fact Contessa Nicoletta's little bespectacled chef with whom I had been consulting about the menu for Friday, but the Benedicts weren't to know that. 'He has promised to provide something suitably spicy for our tastes. ↗
At the end of our visit, Fleisher agreed to play something on my piano, a beautiful old 1894 Bechstein concert grand that I had grown up with, my father's piano. Fleisher sat at the piano and carefully, tenderly, stretched each finger in turn, and then, with arms and hands almost flat, he started to play. He played a piano transcription of Bach's "Sheep May Safely Graze," as arranged for piano by Egon Petri. Never in its 112 years, I thought, had this piano been played by such a master-I had the feeling that Fleisher has sized up the piano's character and perhaps its idiosyncrasies within seconds, that he had matched his playing to the instrument, to bring out its greatest potential, its particularity. Fleisher seemed to distill the beauty, drop by drop, like an alchemist, into flowing notes of an almost unbearable beauty-and, after this, there was nothing more to be said. ↗
You'll have a good, secure life when being alive means more to you than security, love more than money, your freedom more than public or partisan opinion, when the mood of Beethoven's or Bach's music becomes the mood of your whole life … when your thinking is in harmony, and no longer in conflict, with your feelings … when you let yourself be guided by the thoughts of great sages and no longer by the crimes of great warriors … when you pay the men and women who teach your children better than the politicians; when truths inspire you and empty formulas repel you; when you communicate with your fellow workers in foreign countries directly, and no longer through diplomats... ↗
Marcel ise şöyle öldü: Bir gün bütün berduşların Paris'in kent manzarasından silinmelerine karar verilmişti. Sosyal yardım örgütü, aynı zamanda kentin doğru dürüst bir görünümde olmasıyla da ilgilenen ve düşünülebilecek en resmi nitelikteki sosyal yardım örgütünün ilgilileri, polisle birlikte Rue Monge'a geldiler, tek istedikleri, yaşlı adamları yaşama geri döndürmek, dolayısıyla da yaşama hazır olsunlar diye önce yıkayıp paklamaktı. Marcel yerinden kalkıp onlarla birlikte gitti, çok sakin bir adamdı, birkaç kadeh şarap sonra bile hâlâ bilge ve uysal kalabilen bir insandı. Gelmelerini o gün büyük bir olasılıkla hiç umursamamıştı, belki de caddedeki iyi yerine, metronun sıcak havasının mazgallardan dışarı çıktığı yere geri dönebileceğini düşünüyordu. Ama kamunun esenliği için yapılmış olan, içinde çok sayıda duşun bulunduğu yıkanma salonunda sıra Marcel'e de geldi, onu duşun altına soktular ve duş hiç kuşkusuz ne fazla sıcak, ne de fazla soğuktu, ama Marcel yıllardan beri ilk kez çıplaktı ve ilk kez suyun altına girmişti. Daha kimse durumu kavrayıp yardımına koşamadan düştü ve hemen oracıkta öldü. Ne demek istediğimi anlıyor musun! Malina, biraz ne yapacağını şaşırmış gibi bakıyor, oysa ne yapacağını asla şaşırmaz. Bu öyküyü anlatmayabilirdim. Ama duşu bir defa daha hissediyorum, Marcel'in üstündeki neleri yıkamaya hakları yoktu, bunu biliyorum. Eğer bir insan kendi mutluluğun buharları arasında yaşıyorsa, eğer bir insanın "Allah sizden razı olsun"un dışında söyleyecek pek sözü yoksa, o zaman o insanı yıkamaya kalkışmamalı, o insan için iyi olanı o insanın üstünden yıkayıp akıtmamalı, birini olmayan bir yaşam için arındırmaya kalkışmamalı... ↗
