“Not so long ago as a generation, there was no panting giant here, no heaving, grimy city; there was but a pleasant big town of neighborly people who had understanding of one another, being, on the whole, much of the same type. It was a leisurely and kindly place— “homelike,” it was called — and when the visitor had been taken through the State Asylum for the Insane and made to appreciate the view of the cemetery from a little hill, his host’s duty as Baedeker was done. The good burghers were given to jogging comfortably about in phaetons or in surreys for a family drive on Sunday. No one was very rich; few were very poor; the air was clean, and there was time to live. But there was a spirit abroad in the land, and it was strong here as elsewhere — a spirit that had moved in the depths of the American soil and labored there, sweating, till it stirred the surface, rove the mountains, and emerged, tangible and monstrous, the god of all good American hearts — Bigness. And that god wrought the panting giant.”
Quote by Booth Tarkington
Book:The Turmoil
Work
The Turmoil
Browse quotes and source details for this work. more
Author
Booth Tarkington
Booth Tarkington was an American novelist known for his works that often depicted the lives of the upper class in the early 20th century. His writing style was characterized by wit and social commentary, and he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction twice. more
You May Also Like
Source: L'amata perduta
Source: The Lord of the Rings
“Home was a ship that was at the bottom of the sea, where my mother's bones lay sleeping.”
Source: Fable
“It's lovely to be going home and know it's home.”
Source: Anne of Green Gables
Source: Yesterday I Was the Moon
“Perhaps home, like the moon will follow wherever she goes.”
Source: The Immortalists
“It's the people that make a home, not the place.”
Source: Servitude is Sanctitude
Source: The UnPeopled Season: Journal from a North Country Wilderness