George Orwell
It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. ― George Orwell, 1984 ( Plume, January 1, 2014) Originally published June 8th 1949.
Category: English Literature
Robert Browning
That’s the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,Lest you should think he never could recaptureThe first fine careless rapture! — Robert Browning, from “Home-Thoughts, from Abroad,” Poetry Magazine
D.H. Lawrence
[P]raise silence, & put flesh on every w All real living hurts as well as fulfils. Happiness comes when we have lived and have a respite for sheer forgetting. Happiness, in the vulgar sense, is just a holiday experience. The life-long happiness lies in being used by life; hurt by life, driven and goaded by… Continue reading D.H. Lawrence
Philip Larkin
Why did I dream of you last night?Now morning is pushing back hair with grey lightMemories strike home, like slaps in the face;Raised on elbow, I stare at the pale fogbeyond the window. So many things I had thought forgottenReturn to my mind with stranger pain:—Like letters that arrive addressed to someoneWho left the house… Continue reading Philip Larkin
D.H. Lawrence
There is love, and it is a deep thing, but there are deeper things than love. — D.H. Lawrence
William Shakespeare
Our revels now are ended. These our actors,As I foretold you, were all spirits andAre melted into air, into thin air:And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,The solemn temples, the great globe itself,Ye all which it inherit, shall dissolveAnd, like this insubstantial pageant faded,Leave not a rack behind. We… Continue reading William Shakespeare
Aleister Crowley
Happiness lies within one’s self, and the way to dig it out is cocaine. ― Aleister Crowley, Diary of a Drug Fiend. Weiser Books June 1977 (first published 1922)
William Shakespeare
With fairest flowersWhilst summer lasts and I live here, Fidele,I’ll sweeten thy sad grave: thou shalt not lackThe flower that’s like thy face, pale primrose, norThe azured harebell, like thy veins, no, norThe leaf of eglantine, whom not to slander,Out-sweeten’d not thy breath: the ruddock would,With charitable bill,–O bill, sore-shamingThose rich-left heirs that let their… Continue reading William Shakespeare
Mary Shelley
I, too, can create desolation. — Mary Shelley, Frankenstein. Published 1818 (Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones)
Virginia Woolf
The melancholy river bears us on. When the moon comes through the trailing willow boughs, I see your face, I hear your voice and the bird singing as we pass the osier bed. What are you whispering? Sorrow, sorrow. Joy, joy. Woven together, like reeds in moonlight. — Virginia Woolf, from “The String Quartet,” Monday… Continue reading Virginia Woolf
The Vale of Soul-Making 