“But the body fails us and the mirror knows, and we no longer insist that the gray hush be carried off its surface by the cloth, for we have run to fat, and wrinkles encircle the eyes and notch the neck where the skin wattles, and the flesh of the arms hangs loose like an overlarge sleeve, veins thicken like ropes and empurple the body as though they had been drawn there by a pen, freckles darken, liver spots appear, the hairah, the hair is exhausted and gray and lusterless, in weary rolls like cornered lint.” KnowsSelfBodyEyeRunningFailingHairArmsSkinsMirrorsAgingSurfaceFleshFatsSpotsNecksPensGrayWearyExhaustedVeinsRopeSleevesWrinklesLiverHushNotchesFrecklesCornered Author:William H. Gass
“How do we know, then, when a code's been cracked?when we are right?when do we know if we have even received a message? Why, naturally, when, upon one set of substitutions, sense emerges like the outline under a rubbing; when a single tentative construal leads to several; when all the sullen letters of the code cry TEAM! after YEA! has been, by several hands, uncovered.” IfsKnowsHas BeensHandsReadingTeamCryMessagesLettersCodeInterpretationOutlinesCrackedSullenSubstitution Book:World Within The Word Source: World Within The Word
“I do think of my reader, or listener, really, more often, if I give a lecture, for example, and I know that I'm talking to these people; I enjoy sort of preening them a bit. But it's a matter of decorum, basically.” PeopleIfsThinkingKnowsGivingMatterBitsEnjoyTalkingExampleReaderListenersLecturesDecorum Author:William H. Gass
“I hate ideologies of all kinds, so I avoid jargon. I've done enough philosophy to know that some specialized terms are really needed. I don't complain when Kant does it. Or when Aristotle introduces all kinds of new words; he needed them. But these other people [modern philosophers] are just obfuscating. It just makes me annoyed.” PeopleKnowsKindDoeDoneEnoughPhilosophyHateTermModernNeededI HatePhilosopherComplainingAll KindsIdeologyIntroducingAnnoyedJargonNew Words Author:William H. Gass
“I don't know myself, what to do, where to go... I lie in the crack of a book for my comfort... it's what the world offers... please leave me alone to dream as I fancy.” KnowsWorldBookDreamLyingComfortPleaseOffersFancyCracksLeaving MeMe AloneLeave Me Alone Author:William H. Gass
“We must take our sentences seriously, which means we must understand them philosophically, and the odd thing is that the few who do, who take them with utter sober seriousness, the utter sober seriousness of right-wing parsons and political saviors, the owners of Pomeranians, are the liars who want to be believed, the novelists and poets, who know that the creatures they imagine have no other being than the sounding syllables which the reader will speak into his own weary and distracted head. There are no magic words. To say the words is magical enough.” KnowsWantMeanEnoughPoliticalSpeakImagineMagicPoetReaderCreaturesWingsSentencesOddNovelistsOwnersLiarsSaviorWearySoberDistractedSeriousnessRight WingSyllablesOdd ThingsMagic WordsPomeranians Author:William H. Gass
“Works of art are meant to be lived with and loved, and if we try to understand them, we should try to understand them as we try to understand anyone — in order to know them better, not in order to know something else.” IfsKnowsShouldTryingArtOrderWorks Of ArtMeant To Be Author:William H. Gass
