#writings

A people's literature is the great textbook for real knowledge of them. The writings of the day show the quality of the people as no historical reconstruction can. ↗

— Edith Hamilton

#great #historical #knowledge #literature #people

The basic drive behind real philosophy is curiosity about the world, not interest in the writings of philosophers. ↗

— Bryan Magee

#basic #behind #curiosity #drive #interest

it strikes me that the writers most deeply concerned with the state of literary fiction and its biases against women could do a lot worse than trying to coin some terms of their own: to name the archetypes they wish to invert or criticise and thereby open up the discussion. If authors can be thought of as magicians in any sense, then the root of our power has always rested with words: choosing them, arranging them and – most powerfully – inventing them. Sexism won’t go away overnight, and nor will literary bias. But until then, if we’re determined to invest ourselves in bringing about those changes, it only makes sense to arm ourselves with a language that we, and not our enemies, have chosen. May 14, 2011 Blog post ↗

— Foz Meadows

#importance-of-words #language #literary-bias #writings #change

It is insight into human nature that is the key to the communicator's skill. For whereas the writer is concerned with what he puts into his writings, the communicator is concerned with what the reader gets out of it. He therefore becomes a student of how people read or listen. ↗

— William Bernbach

#communicator #concerned #gets #his #how

If you study the writings of the mystics, you will always find things in them that appear to be paradoxes, as in Zen, particularly. ↗

— Alan Watts

#appear #find #paradoxes #particularly #study

Do not suppose, dearest Sir, that I am so short-sighted as to destroy my life by English preaching, or any other preaching. St. Paul did much good by his preaching, but how much more by his writings. ↗

— Henry Martyn

#any #dearest #destroy #did #english

If we took Chaucer's writings at face value, we'd have to conclude he was a complete drip. ↗

— John Hutton

#complete #conclude #drip #face #face value

A poet is a blind optimist. The world is against him for many reasons. But the poet persists. He believes that he is on the right track, no matter what any of his fellow men say. In his eternal search for truth, the poet is alone. He tries to be timeless in a society built on time. ↗

— Jack Kerouac

#beat #early-stories-and-other-writings #jack-kerouac #optimist #prose-poetry

I think that I've tried many times to get Cuba in my writings, especially Havana, which was once a great and fascinating city. ↗

— Guillermo Cabrera Infante

#cuba #especially #fascinating #get #great

And truly, when you look at the Constitution and our founding fathers and their writings, the things that made this country great, you might draw those conclusions: That they were conservative. They were fiscally conservative and socially conservative. ↗

— Sharron Angle

#conservative #constitution #country #draw #fathers