I should bear that in mind

"Are you paralyzed with fear?  That's a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. Remember our rule of thumb:  The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it. 

Resistance is experienced as fear; the degree of fear equates the strength of Resistance. Therefore, the more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul."

Steven Pressfield, The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles

The Reader's Bill of Rights and other reading stuff

"Time spent reading, like time spent loving, increases our lifetime."

"A well-chosen book saves you from everything, including yourself."

"Le verbe "lire" ne supporte pas  l’impératif. Aversion qu'il aime partager avec quelques autres;  le verbe "aimer"... le verbe "rêver"..." 

"We keep quiet about what we read. Our enjoyment of a book remains a jealously guarded secret. Because there's no need to talk, or because it takes time to distill what we've read before we say anything. Silence is our guarantee of intimacy. We might have finished reading but we're still reading the book."

quotes by  Daniel Pennac

Ernest Hemingway

"When I am working on a book or a story I write every morning as soon after first light as possible. There is no one to disturb you and it is cool or cold and you come to your work and warm as you write. You read what you have written and, as you always stop when you know what is going to happen next, you go on from there. You write until you come to a place where you still have your juice and know what will happen next and you stop and try to live through until the next day when you hit it again. You have started at six in the morning, say, and may go on until noon or be through before that. When you stop you are as empty, and at the same time never empty but filling, as when you have made love to someone you love. Nothing can hurt you, nothing can happen, nothing means anything until the next day when you do it again. It is the wait until the next day that is hard to get through."

"A writer who can both write and teach should be able to do both. Many competent writers have proved it could be done. I could not do it, I know, and I admire those who have been able to. I would think though that the academic life could put a period to outside experience which might possibly limit growth of knowledge of the world. Knowledge, however, demands more responsibility of a writer and makes writing more difficult. Trying to write something of permanent value is a full-time job even though only a few hours a day are spent on the actual writing. A writer can be compared to a well. There are as many kinds of wells as there are writers. The important thing is to have good water in the well, and it is better to take a regular amount out than to pump the well dry and wait for it to refill."

"I have the nightmares and know about the ones other people have. But you do not have to write them down. Anything you can omit that you know you still have in the writing and its quality will show. When a writer omits things he does not know, they show like holes in his writing."

"I suppose there are symbols since critics keep finding them. If you do not mind I dislike talking about them and being questioned about them. It is hard enough to write books and stories without being asked to explain them as well. Also it deprives the explainers of work. If five or six or more good explainers can keep going why should I interfere with them? Read anything I write for the pleasure of reading it. Whatever else you find will be the measure of what you brought to the reading."

"The Old Man and the Sea could have been over a thousand pages long and had every character in the village in it and all the processes of how they made their living, were born, educated, bore children, et cetera. That is done excellently and well by other writers. In writing you are limited by what has already been done satisfactorily. So I have tried to learn to do something else. First I have tried to eliminate everything unnecessary to conveying experience to the reader so that after he or she has read something it will become a part of his or her experience and seem actually to have happened. This is very hard to do and I’ve worked at it very hard.

Anyway, to skip how it is done, I had unbelievable luck this time and could convey the experience completely and have it be one that no one had ever conveyed. The luck was that I had a good man and a good boy and lately writers have forgotten there still are such things. Then the ocean is worth writing about just as man is. So I was lucky there. I’ve seen the marlin mate and know about that. So I leave that out. I’ve seen a school (or pod) of more than fifty sperm whales in that same stretch of water and once harpooned one nearly sixty feet in length and lost him. So I left that out. All the stories I know from the fishing village I leave out. But the knowledge is what makes the underwater part of the iceberg."

quotes from Interview, The Art of Fiction  No.21, The Paris Review

Ένοχη!

"(...) κανείς δεν έχει το δικαίωμα να ιδιοποιείται φωτογραφίες που δεν του ανήκουν, εκτός κι αν του προσφερθούν, όταν κουβαλάει κανείς τη φωτογραφία ενός ανθρώπου στην τσέπη είναι σαν να κουβαλάει λίγη από την ψυχή του."

Todos os nomes (Όλα τα Ονόματα), Zose Saramango

Le Maître de Forges ( Ο Αρχισιδηρουργός), George Ohnet

" -Moi! cria Claire avec rage...

Elle partit d'un éclat de rire douloureux, qui se termina par un sanglot. Ses yeux s'emplirent de larmes et, s'abattant dans les bras de son amie, le visage rougissant de honte, elle pleura amèrement. "

" -Εγώ; φώναξε η Κλαίρη σαν μανιακή.

Και άρχισε να γελά με ένα πονεμένο γέλιο που κατέληξε σε λυγμούς. Τα μάτια της γέμισαν δάκρυα και πέφτοντας στην αγκαλιά της εξαδέλφης  της, άρχισε να κλαίη πικρά με το πρόσωπο κατακόκκινο από ντροπή. "

The Shadow Line (Γραμμή Σκιάς), Joseph Conrad

by Svorgan

" I don't know what I expected. Perhaps nothing else than that special intensity of existence which is the quintessence of youthful aspirations. Whatever I expected I did not expect to be beset by hurricanes."

"Δεν ξέρω τι περίμενα. Τίποτε άλλο, ίσως, από την ιδιαίτερη εκείνη ένταση της ύπαρξης που αποτελεί την πεμπτουσία των νεανικών προσδοκιών. Το μόνο που δε περίμενα ήταν να πέσω σε κυκλώνες. " (μτφρ. Ξενοφών Κομνηνός)

In my book

The Sugar Queen, Sarah Addison Allen

Jane Austen quote

Ξαναβλέποντας ή ξαναδιαβάζοντας έργα της, και συγκεκριμένα το Pride and Prejudice (Περηφάνια και προκατάληψη ), δύο φράσεις της μου έκαναν αυτή τη φορά τόσο μεγάλη εντύπωση:

"There are few people whom I really love, and still fewer of whom I think well. The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and of the dependence that can be placed on the appearance of either merit or sense."

(«Γιατί, είναι πολύ λίγοι οι άνθρωποι που αγαπώ αληθινά και ακόμα πιο λίγοι εκείνοι που εκτιμώ. Όσο πιο πολύ γνωρίζω τον κόσμο, τόσο λιγότερο μου αρέσει. Και, κάθε μέρα που περνάει, επικυρώνει τη γνώμη μου για την ασυνέπεια που έχουν ο χαρακτήρες όλων των ανθρώπων και βλέπω πόσο λίγο μπορεί κανείς να βασιστεί σε μιαν απατηλή εμφάνιση που δείχνει είτε αξία είτε φρόνηση.»)

Τον τελευταίο καιρό διάφορα περιστατικά μου φέρνουν στο νου αυτή τη φράση. Όχι δε χάνω την πίστη μου στους ανθρώπους τελείως, αλλά γεγονός είναι ότι γύρω μας υπάρχουν αρκετοί κ.κ. Κόλλινς και Γουίκαμ. Ναι δεν αντιλέγω είναι ρομάντζα τα έργα της, και πόσο υποτιμητικό είναι για μια κοπέλα σήμερα να διαβάζει τέτοια! Εμένα μ'αρέσουν όμως. Η ρομαντικούρα που σήμερα κοροϊδεύουμε, στην πραγματικότητα κορόιδευε στην εποχή της την τεράστια επίδραση του ρομαντισμού στις γυναίκες (βλ. Sense and Sensibility ).

Αυτό όμως που πραγματικά θαυμάζω στη Π.κ.Π. είναι το πνεύμα της ηρωίδας. Το γεγονός οτι μπορούσε να γελάει με τις ανθρώπινες γελοιότητες και την κουταμάρα που έβλεπε γύρω της, η ετοιμολογία της, κι ότι μπορούσε να πάει ως ένα σημείο κόντρα στις νόρμες της εποχής για την ευτυχία της.

"...απουσιάζει η περιγραφή της φύσης, κάθε περιγραφή των αντικειμένων, κάθε περιγραφή του χώρου και αυτών, ακόμη, των ανθρώπινων μορφών.(...)Όλα αφήνονται στην ομιλία των ανθρώπωνκαι στον εσωτερικό τους διάλογο, όπως συμβαίνει και με την Ελίζαμπεθ. Το μυθιστόρημα αυτό είναι σκέτος διάλογος. (...) Δεν νοιάζεται παρά μονάχα για το εσωτερικό των ανθρώπων και τα γεγονότα.

Ακόμη, δεν υπάρχει υψηλός πυρετός, Δεν βουρδουλιάζουν τις ψυχές άνεμοι καφτεροί, πάθη τρικυμιώδη.(...) Είναι αισθήματα που αποδίδουνε την ψυχική πραγματικότητα του μεσαίου Άγγλου της εποχής εκείνης... -Στάθης Πρωταίος"

παραθέτω και link που εντόπισα πρόσφατα, σε περίπτωση που κάποιος θέλει να διαβάσει το βιβλίο στο ίντερνετ (στα αγγλικά). Παλιά έκδοση (απ'αυτές που θα χρυσοπλήρωνα να έχω!) μιας και έχει, πέρα από απίστευτο εξώφυλλο, και γκραβούρες που τόσο πολύ αγαπώ!