Quotessence
Home / Authors / Edward Rutherfurd Biography
Edward Rutherfurd

Edward Rutherfurd Biography

Writer

Related Quotes

“And suddenly it came to him. That Strawberry Fields garden he'd come from, and the Freedom Tower he'd been thinking of: taken together, didn't they contain the two words that said it all about this city, the two words that really mattered? It seemed to him that they did. Two words: the one an invitation, the other an ideal, an adventure, a necessity. "Imagine" said the garden. "Freedom" said the tower. Imagine freedom. That was the spirit, the message of this city he loved. You really didn't need anything more. Dream it and do it. But first you must dream it.”

InspirationalDreamImaginationFreedomImagineNew York City
Book:New York
Create image

“Many countries have accepted the Jews, … and always they have turned against them in the end. The Jews will only survive if they are strong. This is the lesson of history. … We were commanded to keep our faith. So let me tell you: every time a Jew marries out, we are weakened. Marry out, and in two, three generations, your family will not be Jewish. Maybe they will be safe, maybe not. But in the end, either way, all that we have will be lost.”

JewsInterfaith Marriage
Book:New York
Create image

“The hill was mainly composed of the soft stone material known as gypsum which possessed two qualities: first, it would slowly dissolve in water and was thus a poor foundation for any large building. Second, when heated, after giving off steam, it could easily be ground into the powder from which white plaster was made. For that reason, men had been burying into the hill of Montmartre for centuries to extract the gypsum. So famous had these quarrying's become, that now, even across the ocean, white plaster had come to be known as Plaster of Paris. When the builders of Sacre Coeur began their task therefore, they found that the underlying terrain was not only soft, but so honeycombed with mineshafts and tunnels that had the great building been placed directly upon it, the entire hill would have surely collapsed, leaving the church in a stupendous sinkhole. The solution had been very French, a combination of elegant logic and vast ambition: 83 gigantic shafts were dug, each over 100 feet deep filled with concrete. Upon these mighty columns, like a huge box, almost as deep as the church above, the crypt was constructed as a platform. This work alone had taken almost a decade, and by the end of it, even those who hated the project would remark with rye amusement: 'Montmartre isn't holding up the church, it's the church that's holding up Montmartre'.”

MontmartreSacre Coeur
Book:Paris
Create image

“Onion soup, the food of the poor, but delicious for all that. Fresh baguettes from the bakers. Madam Gascon's ragout would usually consist of pig's trotters, vegetables, and whatever seasonings she had. Food that was as cheap as it was healthy. But today, there were morsels of beef swimming in a sauce that was thicker than they had tasted in a long while, Then, there was a camembert and a goat cheese and a hard gruyere, all washed down with cheap red wine.”

French CookingRagout
Book:Paris
Create image

“Seen from a distance, the hill of Montmartre hadn't changed much since Roman times. For centuries, old vines had grown there tended by local nuns in the Middle Ages, though the vineyards nowadays had either been built upon or lapsed into waste ground. But one pleasant change had occurred, a number of wooden windmills had gathered near the summit, their lumbering sails turning in the wind, giving the hill a picturesque appearance.”

Montmartre
Book:Paris
Create image

“True the greater part of the Irish people was close to starvation. The numbers of weakened people dying from disease were rising. So few potatoes had been planted that, even if they escaped bight, they would not be enough to feed the poor folk who relied upon them. More and more of those small tenants and cottagers, besides, were being forced off the land and into a condition of helpless destitution. Ireland, that is to say, was a country utterly prostrated. Yet the Famine came to an end. And how was this wonderful thing accomplished? Why, in the simplest way imaginable. The famine was legislated out of existence. It had to be. The Whigs were facing a General Election.”

BritishIrelandFaminePotatoWhigs
Book:The Rebels of Ireland
Create image

“Don't you know that there's another bubble as well An expectations bubble. Bigger houses private planes yachts ...... stupid salaries and bonuses. People come to desire these things and expect them. But the expectations bubble will burst as well as all bubbles do. Come to my gallery and I will sell you beautiful things at a more reasonable price. But the point is that they will have value. Things of real beauty things of the spirit.”

PeopleKnowsWellsRealBeautifulSpiritDesireValuesHouseStupidExpectationsBiggerSellsPlanesReasonableBubblesBeautiful ThingsSalaryGalleryBonusYachtReal Beauty
Author:Edward Rutherfurd
Create image