“The moment in the account of Adam and Eve in the book of Genesis is when they realize they're naked and try and cover themselves with fig leaves. That seemed to me a perfect allegory of what happened in the 20th century with regard to literary modernism. Literary modernism grew out of a sense that, “Oh my god! I'm telling a story! Oh, that can't be the case, because I'm a clever person. I'm a literary person! What am I going to do to distinguish myself?...a lot of modernism does seem to come out of a fear of being thought an ordinary storyteller.” TryingPersonsDoeBookMomentsStoriesSeemsRealizingPerfectCasesHappenedCenturyGrewOrdinaryAccountsRegardCleverNakedAdamStoryteller20th CenturyGenesisModernismAdam And EveAllegoryFigsBook Of GenesisClever Person Author:Philip Pullman
“I'll be looking for you, Will, every moment, every single moment. And when we do find each other again, we'll cling together so tight that nothing and no one'll ever tear us apart. Every atom of me and every atom of you... We'll live in birds and flowers and dragonflies and pine trees and in clouds and in those little specks of light you see floating in sunbeams... And when they use our atoms to make new lives, they wont' just be able to take one, they'll have to take two, one of you and one of me, we'll be joined so tight.” LittlesTwoMomentsUseLightAbleTogetherTreeTearsFlowerBirdCloudsAtomsNew LifeFloatingSpecksFantasy BooksSunbeamsPine TreesLiterary LoveDragonfliesHis Dark Materials Book:The Amber Spyglass Source: The Amber Spyglass
“She wondered whether there would ever come an hour in her life when she didn't think of him -- didn't speak to him in her head, didn't relive every moment they'd been together, didn't long for his voice and his hands and his love. She had never dreamed of what it would feel like to love someone so much; of all the things that had astonished her in her adventures, that was what astonished her the most. She thought the tenderness it left in her heart was like a bruise that would never go away, but she would cherish it forever.” ThinkingFeelsHeartLongMomentsHandsTogetherLeftSpeakVoiceHoursForeverAdventureGoing AwayCherishTendernessHis LoveLove SomeoneBruises Author:Philip Pullman
“I don't expect Christians to see God as a metaphor, but that's what he is. Perhaps it might be clearer to call him a character in fiction, and a very interesting one too: one of the greatest and most complex villains of all - savage, petty, boastful and jealous, and yet capable of moments of tenderness and extremes of arbitrary affection - for David, for example. But he's not real, any more than Hamlet or Mr Pickwick are real. They are real in the context of their stories, but you won't find them in the phone book.” BookRealMomentsCharacterStoriesMightChristianInterestingFictionExampleCapableComplexesMetaphorPhonesAffectionExtremesJealousVillainTendernessSavagesPettyArbitraryVery Interesting Author:Philip Pullman
“When you choose one way out of many, all the ways you don't take are snuffed out like candles, as if they'd never existed. At that moment all Will's choices existed at once. But to keep them all in existence meant doing nothing. He had to choose, after all.” IfsWayMomentsChoicesExistenceOne WayThat MomentCandleYou ChooseDoing Nothing Book:The Amber Spyglass Source: The Amber Spyglass
“One moment several things are possible, the next moment only one happens, and the rest don't exist. Except that other worlds have sprung into being, on which the did happen.” WorldMomentsHappensNextExistenceOther WorldsSprung Author:Philip Pullman
“If a coin comes down heads, that means that the possibility of its coming down tails has collapsed. Until that moment the two possibilities were equal. But on another world, it does come down tails. And when that happens, the two worlds split apart.” IfsWorldMeanDoeTwoMomentsHappensPossibilityEqualThat MomentSplitsTailsCoinsAnother WorldTwo Worlds Author:Philip Pullman
“Gradually, at various points in our childhoods, we discover different forms of conviction. There's the rock-hard certainty of personal experience ("I put my finger in the fire and it hurt,"), which is probably the earliest kind we learn. Then there's the logically convincing, which we probably come to first through maths, in the context of Pythagoras's theorem or something similar, and which, if we first encounter it at exactly the right moment, bursts on our minds like sunrise with the whole universe playing a great chord of C Major.” IfsMindFirstsKindDifferentHardWholeMomentsFormScienceUniverseHurtFireChildhoodRocksMajorsLogicOur ChildrenFingersVariousConvictionMathCertaintyEncountersSunriseIt HurtsConvincingChordsPersonal ExperiencesTheoremsRight Moment Author:Philip Pullman
“And barely ten minutes later the soft sound of wingbeats came to their ears, and Balthamos stood up eagerly. The next moment, the two angels were embracing, and Will, gazing into the flames, saw their mutual affection. More than affection: they loved each other with a passion.” LoveTwoMomentsAgePassionNextSoundSawsMinutesTenAngelEarsAffectionFlamesMutualStood UpGazing Book:The Amber Spyglass Source: The Amber Spyglass
