| Florilegium |
[Mar. 23rd, 2009|12:07 pm] |
"Perchance," said he, as the five lads lay in the rustling stillness through which sounded the monotonous cooing of the pigeons -- "perchance there may be dwarfs and giants and dragons and enchanters and evil knights and whatnot even nowadays. And who knows but that if we Knights of the Rose hold together we may go forth into the world, and do battle with them, and save beautiful ladies, and have tales and gestes written about us as they are writ about the Seven Champions and Arthur his Round Table."
Howard Pyle, Men of Iron (1891). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 16th, 2009|01:45 pm] |
Not great things needs give a man:
bringeth thanks oft a little thing;
with half a loaf and a half-drained cup
I won me oft worthy friend.
The Hávamál (MS C 12-13). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 11th, 2009|12:47 pm] |
By blunting the sense through sensationalism, kitsch renders disappointing not only art but also life itself. Kitsch shares that quality with pornography.
Curtis F. Brown, Star-Spangled Kitsch (1975). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 10th, 2009|04:16 pm] |
His blood boiled, his heart pounded so loudly in his breast that the sexton's deaf old widow sitting at her table eating her evening meal two houses away cried out "Come in!" because she believed he had knocked at her door. And so he, too, resolved to sally forth and try his luck at retrieving the princess’s shadow.
Hans Dieckmann, Twice Told Tales: The Psychological Use of Fairy Tales (1978). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 9th, 2009|01:37 pm] |
We are Turks with the affections of our women; and have made them subscribe to our doctrine too. We let their bodies go abroad liberally enough, with smiles and ringlets and pink bonnets to disguise them instead of veils and yakmaks. But their souls must be seen by only one man, and they obey not unwillingly…
William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair (1847-48). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 5th, 2009|02:33 pm] |
If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.
Jack Handey, Deep Thoughts (1992). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 4th, 2009|11:46 am] |
Milk! milk! milk
Straight as the Parson's bands,
Streaming like silk
Under and over her hands --
What is Mary scheming?
What is Mary dreaming?
Swish! swish! swish!
Pressing her sweet young brow,
Smooth as a dish,
To the side of the sober cow --
Can she tell no tale then?
Naught but milk and pail then?
T.E. Brown, "Lynton Verses," The Collected Poems of T.E. Brown (1909). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 3rd, 2009|04:27 pm] |
When a beholder enters a garden
In his love for the rose his heart is charred like a tulip's.
Jámí, Yúsuf u Zulaykhá (C15); quoted in Reuben Levy, Persian Literature: An Introduction (1923). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 2nd, 2009|08:43 pm] |
Today the Victorian viewpoint seems ludicrously inadequate, yet we cannot claim to have replaced it with anything more substantial...
Michael Goss, The Halifax Slasher: An Urban Terror in the North of England (1987). |
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| Florilegium |
[Mar. 2nd, 2009|01:22 pm] |
I cannot tell who loves the Skeleton
Of a poor Marmoset. Nought but boan, boan.
Give me a nakednesse with her cloath's on.
Richard Lovelace, “La Belle Bona Roba” (c. 1640) |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 27th, 2009|02:22 pm] |
No one would condemn the family as an institution because it tends to foster nepotism.
Baigent & Leigh, The Temple and The Lodge (1989?). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 26th, 2009|10:41 am] |
How sweet
To be an idiot,
As harmless as a cloud
Too small to hide the sun,
Almost poking fun
At the warm but insecure,
Untidy crowd.
Neil Innes, "How Sweet to Be an Idiot" (1973). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 26th, 2009|12:01 am] |
It has been taught in the name of Rabbi Meir:
When a man comes into the world, his hands are clenched,
as thought to say: All the entire world is mine; now I shall acquire it.
And when he goes out of the world, his hands are wide open,
as though to say: I have acquired nothing from this world.
Ecclesiastes Rabbah (C7?). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 24th, 2009|07:54 pm] |
No ancient legend of fabled monsters surpasses the modern scientist's account of extinct gigantic fauna. Nor can the creation-myths on Egyptian papyri, Babylonian bricks, or Indian palm-leaf books approach in grandness and charm the story of the four great geological Ages of the World.
Donald A. Mackenzie, Crete and Pre-Hellenic Myths and Legends (1917). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 24th, 2009|11:45 am] |
And if a man is distracted by perplexity,
God has spoken a riddle in his ear
To imprison him between two purposes;
For he says: "Shall I do that or its opposite?"
Also from God comes preference for one alternative;
Of the two he chooses one wing.
Jalálu 'l Dín Rúmí, Masnawí i Ma’nawí (C13); quoted in Reuben Levy, Persian Literature: An Introduction (1923). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 23rd, 2009|01:45 pm] |
Ov all the brooks drough the meäds a-windèn,
Ov all the meäds by a river's brim,
There's nwone so feäir o' my own heard's vindèn
As where the maïdens do zee thee zwim,
An' stan' to teäke, O
Wi' long-stemmed reäke, O,
Thy flow'r afloat, goolden zummer clote!
William Barnes, "The Clote," Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect (1888). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 22nd, 2009|10:28 pm] |
I never vote. It only encourages them.
Lord Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst; quoted in Camden Benares, ZEN Without Zen Masters (1977). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 20th, 2009|02:28 pm] |
Than fire hotter for five days burneth
love between friends that are false;
it dieth down when dawneth the sixth,
then all the sweetness turns sour.
"Hávamál" (C9?). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 19th, 2009|02:05 am] |
Wanderers eastward, wanderers west,
Know you why you cannot rest?
'Tis that every mother’s son
Travails with a skeleton.
A. E. Housman, "The Immortal Part," A Shropshire Lad (1896). |
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| Florilegium |
[Feb. 16th, 2009|07:00 pm] |
There was no doubt that Sally's mind worked in unusual ways. Once, as children, she and Joanne played a game to Twenty Questions. Joanne became more and more irritated -- she hated mysteries -- and finally announced she was quitting. "I can't get the answer, it's impossible," she said.
Sally grinned triumphantly. "That's because I change it with every question," she crowed.
Judy Oppenheimer, Private Demons: The Life of Shirley Jackson (1988). |
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