#beasts

I have been seeing dragons again. Last night, hunched on a beaver dam, one held a body like a badly held cocktail; his tail, keeping the beat of a waltz, sent a morse of ripples to my canoe. They are not richly bright but muted like dawns or the vague sheen on a fly's wing. Their old flesh drags in folds as they drop into grey pools, strain behind a tree. Finally the others saw one today, trapped, tangled in our badminton net. The minute eyes shuddered deep in the creased face while his throat, strangely fierce, stretched to release an extinct burning inside: pathetic loud whispers as four of us and the excited spaniel surrounded him. ↗

— Michael Ondaatje

#humour #magic-realism #mythical-beasts #life

[T]here is no folly of the beasts of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men. ↗

— Herman Melville

#beasts #human-condition #humanity #men #men

We are certainly in a common class with the beasts; every action of animal life is concerned with seeking bodily pleasure and avoiding pain. ↗

— Saint Augustine

#animal #animal life #avoiding #beasts #bodily

The BBC must never be all about ratings - or even mainly about ratings. In the past year, we have made a raft of terrific programmes which stand comparison with the best the BBC has ever done: 'Blue Planet,' 'Walking with Beasts,' 'Son of God,' 'Clocking Off,' 'The Way We Live Now,' 'Conspiracy,' 'Lost World.' ↗

— Gavyn Davies

#bbc #beasts #best #blue #comparison

If it's true that men are such beasts, this must account for the fact that most women are animal lovers. ↗

— Doris Day

#animal #beasts #fact #lovers #men

Wine is the drink of the gods, milk the drink of babes, tea the drink of women, and water the drink of beasts. ↗

— John Stuart Blackie

#beasts #drink #gods #milk #tea

I'm one of those strange beasts who really likes a corset. ↗

— Cate Blanchett

#corset #i #likes #really #strange

We were then in a dangerous, helpless situation, exposed daily to perils and death amongst savages and wild beasts, not a white man in the country but ourselves. ↗

— Daniel Boone

#beasts #country #daily #dangerous #death

Without feelings of respect, what is there to distinguish men from beasts? ↗

— Confucius

#beasts #distinguish #feelings #respect #without

A street thug and a paid killer are professionals - beasts of prey, if you will, who have dissociated themselves from the rest of humanity and can now see human beings in the same way that trout fishermen see trout. ↗

— Willard Gaylin

#beings #fishermen #human #human beings #humanity