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Reversal Quotes

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Reversal Quotes

“Moments later, Sona Kilroy, heading for the open doorway, stepped over the sergeant’s body. With an old auto-rifle in his left hand and his favorite sword in the other, and the sharp melodic din of bolts and bullets ringing in his ears, ‘the Hammer’ grinned an evil grin to himself, well pleased. He wished he could’ve seen the look on the face of Indomitable’s captain when he realized the tables had just been turned on him! The thought amused him. It was bloody hilarious. He cackled, reveling in this complete reversal of fortune. Then he stalked onward with conviction, a grim smile on his lips – intent on taking the ship for himself. * * *”

MomentsEarsLipsConvictionThoughtHilariousBoltsTheAndInJustForOtherHeHimWithReversalIntentOnHisSeenCaptainLaterHadHimselfHammerDoorwayAmused HimCackledIndomitable SKilroyOf FortuneSergeants BodyWell Pleased
Book:Dead Beckoning
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“Getting ahead in a difficult profession - singing, acting, writing, whatever requires avid faith in yourself. You must be able to sustain yourself against staggering blows and unfair reversals. When I think back to those first couple of years in Rome, those endless rejections, without a glimmer of encouragement from anyone, all those failed screen tests, and yet I never let my desire slide away from me, my belief in myself and what I felt I could achieve.”

ThinkingWritingYearsFirstsAbleDesireBeliefFeltDifficultActingAchieveCoupleSingingTestsEncouragementBlowProfessionScreensEndlessRejectionRomeUnfairSlidesFaith In YourselfStaggeringAvidReversal
Author:Sophia Loren
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“The resurrection is the revelation to chosen witnesses of the fact that Jesus who died on the cross is indeed king - conqueror of death and sin, Lord and Savior of all. The resurrection is not the reversal of a defeat but the proclamation of a victory. The King reigns from the tree. The reign of God has indeed come upon us, and its sign is not a golden throne but a wooden cross.”

FactsJesusSinLordTreeKingsVictoryCrossesDiedDefeatChosenGoldenWitnessRevelationsSaviorResurrectionThronesReignConquerorProclamationReversal
Author:Lesslie Newbigin
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“No one supposed that dinoflagellates might actively kill fish as an evolved response for their own specific advantage, including a potential nutritional benefit for the algal cells. And yet the dinoflagellates do seem to be killing and eating fishes in a manner suggesting active evolution for this most peculiar reversal.”

SeemsMightEvolutionBenefitsEatingAdvantageResponseKillingIncludingFishesActiveCellsPeculiarSuggestingReversal
Book:Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms: Essays on Natural History
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“Our parents, our tribesman, our authority figures, clearly expect us to be bad or anti-social or greedy or selfish or dirty or destructive or self-destructive. Our social nature is such that we tend to meet the expectations of our elders. Whenever this reversal took place and our elders stopped expecting us to be social and expected us to be anti-social, just to put it in gross terms, that's when the real fall took place. And we're paying for it dearly.”

RealSelfFallSocialParentTermFiguresAuthorityExpectationsExpectedSelfishDirtyDestructiveExpectingGreedyGrossEldersSelf DestructiveReversalAnti SocialAuthority Figures
Author:Jean Liedloff
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“power is not a thing to be owned. But if you believe that it is such a thing, losing it becomes a possibility to fear. That fear, I think, is one reason for the dark projections of a catastrophic future that are so widespread, in our dual society. The present powerful, being committed to polarization, expect that any new deal will overturn the one that set them in authority; that the last shall be first and the first last, role reversal everywhere, men as slaves, women as masters, in a revolution of contradiction.”

IfsThinkingMenFirstsBelieveReasonLastsFearChangeDarkDealsPowerfulRolesPowerPossibilityMastersRevolutionAuthorityLosingSlaveCommittedContradictionWomens RightsProjectionIf You BelieveNew DealReversalPolarization
Author:Elizabeth Janeway
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“nothing happens in August - except when something really happens in August. World War I began in August, Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait began in August, al Qaida was preparing to bring down the World Trade Center in August. August, in other words, is the time when all of us should prepare our backup plans, chart our reversals of course, [and] think through possible paradigm changes.”

ThinkingWorldShouldWarHappensCoursesPlansTradeThings HappenWar Of The WorldsAlsWorld War IPreparingSaddamHusseinInvasionParadigmAugustWorld TradeWorld Trade CenterBackupReversalKuwaitBackup Plan
Author:Anne Applebaum
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“I think the reason the stories are briskly paced, when they are, is that I like story. I like stories where things happen and there are surprises and reversals, in addition to vivid characters and a memorable voice. So those are the kinds of stories I try to write. And it turns out that's pretty much the only kind of writing that works for TV. It's a medium that just devours story, demands surprises and reversals. So my sensibility is suited to TV storytelling, at least as we think of it today.”

ThinkingWritingTryingKindReasonCharacterStoriesHappensTodayTurnsVoiceTvsDemandSurpriseThings HappenStorytellingMediumsMemorableSensibilityVividReversal
Author:Nick Antosca
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“A sermon is a form that yields a certain kind of meaning in the same way that, say, a sonnet is a form that deals with a certain kind of meaning that has to do with putting things in relation to each other, allowing for the fact of complexity reversal, such things. Sermons are, at their best, excursions into difficulty that are addressed to people who come there in order to hear that.”

PeopleWayKindFactsFormCertainOrderDealsDifficultyRelationComplexityYieldAllowingSermonsSonnetReversalExcursions
Author:Marilynne Robinson
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“The so-called sexual revolution is not, as advertised, a liberation of sexual behavior but rather its reversal. In former days, even under Victoria, sexual intercourse was the natural end and culmination of heterosexual relations. Now one begins with genital overtures instead of a handshake, then waits to see what will turn up (e.g., might become friends later). Like dogs greeting each other nose to tail and tail to nose.”

EndsMightTurnsWaitingNaturalDogRevolutionBehaviorRelationFormerLiberationNosesTailsIntercourseVictoriaGreetingsCulminationHandshakeReversalSexual Revolution
Book:The Last Gentleman and The Second Coming: In One Volume
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“A lot of people think that they are really cool because they don't outline. In my writing group, they would say, "I will never outline. I let the characters take me." C'mon, man - I outline the story, but it's only like one page. It's a list of possible reversals in the story, like things where everything will just change because of this certain reveal or this certain action. Then I start really digging into the character because, to me, I don't care what the story is.”

PeopleThinkingMenWritingCharacterStoriesCareActionCertainGroupsPagesDon't CareListsI Don't CareTake MeReally CoolDiggingOutlinesReversal
Author:Matt de la Pena
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“At that time [90th in Lagos], if you drove through the city, you drove through a foreground that always seemed to be incredibly dramatic and incredibly agonised - smoking, burning, incredible compression. In the first year we stayed on the ground and went everywhere. But then in order to discover whether this was the whole story, we rented a helicopter. And we began to understand that this is not chaos but a highly modern system that had been abandoned, then at some point went into reversal, then slowly came out of it.”

IfsYearsFirstsWholeStoriesOrderCitiesModernChaosIncrediblesBurningDramaticSmokingAbandonedHelicoptersReversalForegroundCompression
Author:Rem Koolhaas
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“What happened in Kosovo was the exact reversal of what happened in 'Fortress Europe' in 1943-45. Let me explain. Air Marshall 'Bomber' Harris used to say that 'Fortress Europe' was a fortress without a roof, since the Allies had air supremacy. Now, if we look at the Kosovo War, what do we see? We see a fortress without walls  but with a roof! Isn't that disappearance extraordinary?!”

IfsLooksWarUsedHappenedAirWallEuropeLet MeExtraordinaryAlliesRoofSupremacyDisappearanceFortressesBombersReversalKosovo
Author:Paul Virilio
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“In Burma, under the present Constitution, the Army can always take over all parts of government if they think this is necessary. so until the Army comes out clearly and consistently in support of the democratic process we cannot say that it's irreversible. But I don't think we need fear a reversal too much either.”

IfsThinkingNeedsGovernmentProcessSupportToo MuchConstitutionArmyDemocraticConsistentlyIrreversibleBurmaReversalDemocratic Process
Author:Aung San Suu Kyi
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