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I Quotes

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All I Quotes

“In the candle's flickering light, the library's thousands of books emerged from the shadows, and for a moment Nicholas could not help admiring them again. During free time he had almost never looked up from the pages he was reading, but now he saw the books anew, from without rather than from within, and was reminded of how beautiful they were simply as objects. The geometrical wonder of them all, each book on its own and all the books together, row upon row, the infinite patterns and possibilities they presented. They were truly lovely.”

“In the Capitol, the citizens unthinkingly participate in the political system largely because they’re distracted; their attention is diverted from politics onto self-centered desires. In District 13, the citizens unthinkingly participate in the political system because of deeply ingrained habits formed through their continual obedience to the myriad rules and regulations imposed by President Coin. The effects of this constant compliance are gradual, cumulative, and dramatic.”

“In the car ahead, Jane was thinking fast and furiously. She had felt the purpose for which Tarzan had asked a few words with her, and she knew that she must be prepared to give him an answer in the very near future. He was not the sort of person one could put off, and somehow that very thought made her wonder if she did not really fear him. And could she love where she feared? She realized the spell that had been upon her in the depths of that far-off jungle, but there was no spell of enchantment now in prosaic Wisconsin. Nor did the immaculate young Frenchman appeal to the primal woman in her, as had the stalwart forest god. Did she love him? She did not know—now. She glanced at Clayton out of the corner of her eye. Was not here a man trained in the same school of environment in which she had been trained—a man with social position and culture such as she had been taught to consider as the prime essentials to congenial association? Did not her best judgment point to this young English nobleman, whose love she knew to be of the sort a civilized woman should crave, as the logical mate for such as herself? Could she love Clayton? She could see no reason why she could not. Jane was not coldly calculating by nature, but training, environment and heredity had all combined to teach her to reason even in matters of the heart. That she had been carried off her feet by the strength of the young giant when his great arms were about her in the distant African forest, and again today, in the Wisconsin woods, seemed to her only attributable to a temporary mental reversion to type on her part—to the psychological appeal of the primeval man to the primeval woman in her nature. If he should never touch her again, she reasoned, she would never feel attracted toward him. She had not loved him, then. It had been nothing more than a passing hallucination, super-induced by excitement and by personal contact. Excitement would not always mark their future relations, should she marry him, and the power of personal contact eventually would be dulled by familiarity. Again she glanced at Clayton. He was very handsome and every inch a gentleman. She should be very proud of such a husband.”

“In The Care and Management of Lies the wonderfully talented Winspear writes irresistibly about the First World War, both in the trenches of France and the fields of England. Her richly complex characters walk right off the page and into our imaginations, as we fight with them, farm with them, cook with them. I devoured this dazzling novel.”

“In the case of a man and a woman [accused of commiting a crime together], both will often agree to the man taking the rap despite the man being more likely to receive a longer sentence and more likely to be raped in prison. If blacks were agreeing to do that for whites, the black community would be smart enough to call that 'learned subservience.'”

“In the case of Alex Haley, Haley's material is located at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, primarily. But there are a whole series of elaborate steps that one has to - has to encounter in order to even begin to do research. There's an attorney. If you want to photocopy material from that archive, you have to get permission from the attorney beforehand.”

“In the case of all other sciences, arts, skills, and crafts, everyone is convinced that a complex and laborious programme of learning and practice is necessary for competence. Yet when it comes to philosophy, there seems to be a currently prevailing prejudice to the effect that, although not everyone who has eyes and fingers, and is given leather and last, is at once in a position to make shoes, everyone nevertheless immediately understands how to philosophize.”

“In the case of Anathem, most of the research had to do with philosophy and metaphysics. Reading this sort of thing has never been my strong suit, so I actually had to be somewhat more "organized and results-driven" than is my habit. I just made up my mind that I was going to have to read some of these philosophy tomes, and I forced myself to read something like 10 pages a day until I had bashed my way through them.”

“In the case of cultural goods, a particularly complicated equation determines value. The socially constructed nature of the valuation process in markets is most clearly visible in the creative and cultural industries because creative works such as art, books, music, and fashion have greater symbolic than material value. For example, readers value books not because of the physical materials (such as paper and ink) that go into the writing and publishing of a book but because of the ideas that the book symbolizes. Special knowledge is required to interpret, understand, and convey this symbolic value and to evaluate cultural goods; individuals need to understand something about art, the history of aesthetic movements in the art world, and the evaluation criteria for art (for example, originality, rarity, technique) to know not only why works by Raoul Dufy are valued but also why they are less valued (and therefore, also less expensive) than those by his contemporary, the abstract artist Pablo Picasso. Thus, the symbolism inherent to cultural goods—which distinguishes them from strictly utilitarian goods, such as, for example, paintbrushes—creates a barrier to their understanding and valuation.”

“In the case of Donald Trump I think you've got to accept that a lot of what's going on in political discourse is based upon judgement. How the economy works - how people work - what will come to pass - what will not come to pass - what is possible - what is not possible. There is this whole modal dimension. There's a lot in politics that is making a judgement about what might be and can be and would be. Trump frightens a lot of people but there is a bizarre possible world in which it turns out as he's vindicated, though most of us think the evidence is against it.”

“In the case of drama (stage, movies, television ), there appear to be people in almost every audience who never quite fully realize that a play is a set of fictional, symbolic representations. An actor is one who symbolizes other people, real or imagined. [...] Also some years ago it was reported that when Edward G. Robinson, who used to play gangster roles with extraordinary vividness, visited Chicago, local hoodlums would telephone him at his hotel to pay their professional respects.”

“In the case of Game Change, the discussion in that film was how our politicians have become so much like celebrities - personality becomes more important than substance so that they can function in a 24-hour news cycle. So the question is, how do you feel about that? Is this what you want from a politician - somebody who's wildly charismatic, but has so little knowledge of substantive issues?”