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E. M. Forster

E. M. Forster Quotes

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Famous E. M. Forster Quotes

“The present flowed by them like a stream. The tree rustled. It had made music before they were born, and would continue after their deaths, but its song was of the moment. The moment had passed. The tree rustled again. Their senses were sharpened, and they seemed to apprehend life. Life passed. The tree rustled again.”

MadeMomentsSongBornTreeSensesStreamsHowards End
Book:Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)
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“The tragedy of preparedness has scarcely been handled, save by the Greeks. Life is indeed dangerous, but not in the way morality would have us believe. It is indeed unmanageable, but the essence of it is not a battle. It is unmanageable because it is a romance, and its essence is romantic beauty.”

WayBelieveRomanceLife IsDangerousMoralityBattleEssenceTragedyGreekPreparednessHowards End
Book:Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)
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“Was Mrs. Wilcox one of the unsatisfactory people- there are many of them- who dangle intimacy and then withdraw it? They evoke our interests and affections, and keep the life of the spirit dawdling around them. Then they withdraw. When physical passion is involved, there is a definite name for such behaviour- flirting- and if carried far enough, it is punishable by law. But no law- not public opinion, even- punishes those who coquette with friendship, though the dull ache that they inflict, the sense of misdirected effort and exhaustion, may be as intolerable. Was she one of these?”

PeopleIfsMayEnoughLawSpiritPassionNamesInterestEffortOpinionInvolvedAffectionIntimacyDullBehaviourDefiniteFlirtingAchePublic OpinionEvokeExhaustionHowards EndCoquette
Book:Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)
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“She would only point out the salvation that was latent in his own soul, and in the soul of every man. Only connect! That was the whole of her sermon. Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height. Live in fragments no longer. Only connect, and the beast and the monk, robbed of the isolation that is life to either, will die.”

MenLoveHumansSoulWholeDiesPassionSalvationEvery ManHeightBeastIsolationProseSermonsFragmentsMonkExaltedLatentHuman LoveHowards End
Author:E. M. Forster
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“Life's very difficult and full of surprises. At all events, I've got as far as that. To be humble and kind, to go straight ahead, to love people rather than pity them, to remember the submerged - well, one can't do all these things at once, worse luck, because they're so contradictory. It's then that proportion comes in - to live by proportion. Don't begin with proportion. Only prigs do that. Let proportion come in as a last resource, when the better things have failed.”

PeopleWellsKindLastsRememberDifficultEventsResourcesLuckSurpriseHumblePityProportionLive ByContradictoryBe HumbleSubmergedHowards End
Book:Delphi Collected Works of E. M. Forster (Illustrated)
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“What is the good of your stars and trees, your sunrise and the wind, if they do not enter into our daily lives? They have never entered into mine, but into yours, we thought--Haven't we all to struggle against life's daily greyness, against pettiness, against mechanical cheerfulness, against suspicion? I struggle by remembering my friends; others I have known by remembering some place--some beloved place or tree--we thought you one of these.”

IfsRememberStarsKnownStruggleTreeHavensMinesWindMy FriendsBelovedDaily LifeSuspicionSunriseCheerfulnessPettinessHowards End
Book:Howard's End
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