Favourite quotes from novels

[Barry Shnikov]

Originally Posted by JonD

"Even on Central Avenue, not the quietest dressed street in the world, he looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food."

"It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window."

"She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket"

"From thirty feet away she looked like a lot of class. From ten feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from thirty feet away."

"The General spoke again, slowly, using his strength as carefully as an out-of-work show-girl uses her last good pair of stockings."

Just a few - same author, three books.

Raymond Chandler: Big Sleep is one of them (the general); others would be - Long goodbye and...Lady in the lake?

"Your sister just tried to sit in my lap while I was standing up."

[Dai]

Don't know if this one has been put in already or not - but here you go

"Punctuality is the theif of time" Oscar Wilde - The picture of Dorain Gray

Well its my excuse for always being late!!

[straycat]

Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe

Mr Pratchett has some classics - I particularly like the line about the man who, in the resulting watch report, "committed suicide" by going into the mended drum and proclaiming himself "vincent the invincible"

Mr Pratchett has some fantastic quotes - one of his footnotes, iirc, reads:

*The greatest lovers on the disc were Melius and Gretalina, who's passionate, soul searing affair would have scorched the pages of history, had it not been for the unfortunate fact that they were born centuries apart, on separate continents. The gods took pity on them, however, and turned him into an ironing board, and her into a small brass bollard.**
**When you're a god, you don't need reasons.

Or even some of his blink-and-you-miss-it throwaway lines (Vimes complaining about a watery cup of coffee, saying 'This is love-in-a-canoe coffee if ever there was any.' - to my shame, I failed to spot the reference, and it had to be pointed out to me.)

[Tiggerbabe]

Originally Posted by straycat264

Or even some of his blink-and-you-miss-it throwaway lines (Vimes complaining about a watery cup of coffee, saying 'This is love-in-a-canoe coffee if ever there was any.' - to my shame, I failed to spot the reference, and it had to be pointed out to me.)

His character names make me smile too - Casanunda, being my favourite one

[Mezzosoprano]

Love TP -

"How did you meet her anyway", said Colon quickly. "What? Oh, our eyes met when I shoved an IOU in her garter, sarge" said Nobby happily.

[JonD]

Originally Posted by Barry Shnikov

Raymond Chandler: Big Sleep is one of them (the general); others would be - Long goodbye and...Lady in the lake?

The first three are from "Farewell My Lovely"; as you say, General Sternwood is from "The Big Sleep"; the make up one is from "The High Window".

I just found this one from a story I don't know called "Playback":

"On the dance floor half a dozen couples were throwing themselves around with the reckless abandon of a night watchman with arthritis"

Sounds like a blues room to me!

[whitetiger1518]

Originally Posted by Mezzosoprano

Love TP -

"How did you meet her anyway", said Colon quickly. "What? Oh, our eyes met when I shoved an IOU in her garter, sarge" said Nobby happily.

Found these two:

God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of his own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players, to being involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.

Terry Pratchett, "Good Omens"


The truth may be out there, but the lies are inside your head.

Terry Pratchett, "Hogfather", footnote

Whitetiger

[Dreadful Scathe]

There are other contenders for best analogy im sure i posted this years ago somewhere ...

[Dreadful Scathe]

My favourite is

He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

[Beowulf]

Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe

There are other contenders for best analogy im sure i posted this years ago somewhere ...

funny link but this one

Originally Posted by DS's Link

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

Is lifted straight out of hitchhikers guide to the galaxy

Originally Posted by Douglas Adams on Vogon Shops

The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't

[Dreadful Scathe]

Originally Posted by Beowulf1970

funny link but this one



Is lifted straight out of hitchhikers guide to the galaxy

its hardly lifted. Its an obvious bad analogy, one i could've come up with myself.

[Dreadful Scathe]

just had to post this.....cant stop laughing ..hahahaha

[straycat]

Originally Posted by Beowulf1970

funny link but this one

Is lifted straight out of hitchhikers guide to the galaxy

True enough. Another set of books ripe for quoting:

"In the beginning, the universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry, and is widely regarded as a bad move."

or this gem:

Prosser: The plans were on display.
Arthur: I eventually had to go down to the cellar...
Prosser: That's the display department.
Arthur: ... with a torch.
Prosser: Ah, the lights had probably gone.
Arthur: So had the stairs.
Prosser: But you found the notice, didn't you?
Arthur: Yes. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.’ Ever thought of going into advertising?

[Stuart M]

Originally Posted by straycat264

True enough. Another set of books ripe for quoting:

"In the beginning, the universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry, and is widely regarded as a bad move."

Don't start me...

My unsung favourites are Marvin's description of Trillian in the third book, the only quadruple negative I've ever read:
"Trillian is one of the least benightedly unintelligent life forms it has been my profound lack of pleasure not to be able to avoid meeting."

And the cautionary teleport limerick:

"I teleported hom one night,
with Ron and Sid and Meg.
Ron stole Meggie's heart away,
and I got Sidney's leg"

[Beowulf]

I like this opening paragraph from one of my Favorite Books, Films (and thanks to Twirly) T-shirts

"There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is
Pete, Georgie, and Dim. Dim being really dim, and we sat in
the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do
with the evening, a flip dark chill winter b*stard though dry.
The Korova Milkbar was a milk-plus mesto, and you may, O
my brothers, have forgotten what these mestos were like,
things changing so skorry these days and everybody very
quick to forget, newspapers not being read much neither.
Well, what they sold there was milk plus something else. They
had no license for selling liquor, but there was no law yet
against prodding some of the new veshches which they used
to put into the old moloko, so you could peet it with vel-
locet or synthemesc or drencrom or one or two other vesh-
ches which would give you a nice quiet horrorshow fifteen
minutes admiring Bog And All His Holy Angels and Saints in
your left shoe with lights bursting all over your mozg."

(Jeez that made my spell checker complain.. just as well I didn't post a quote from Feersum Endjinn )

[timbp]

"They went for the greater glory of God. They meant no harm."

That quote is from the back cover blurb—which is supposed to sell the book. For several years, I looked at the book, read the back cover, and didn't buy it, because I didn't want to read a tragedy.

The prologue expands this:
"They went for the reasons Jesuits have always gone to the farthest frontiers of human exploration. They went ad majorem Dei gloriam: for the greater glory of God.
They meant no harm."

Eventually, I read it. And it is one of the best books I've ever read. Not an easy read, not a happy read, but ultimately a great read.

PS. I went to a Jesuit school.

[rubyred]

Originally Posted by Beowulf

I like this opening paragraph from one of my Favorite Books, Films (and thanks to Twirly) T-shirts

"There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is
Pete, Georgie, and Dim. Dim being really dim, and we sat in
the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do
with the evening, ..................to the old moloko, so you could peet it with vel-locet or synthemesc or drencrom or one or two other vesh-
ches which would give you a nice quiet horrorshow fifteen
minutes admiring Bog And All His Holy Angels and Saints in
your left shoe with lights bursting all over your mozg."

(Jeez that made my spell checker complain.. just as well I didn't post a quote from Feersum Endjinn )

Clockwork Orange ..Anthony Burgess

Originally Posted by timbp

"They went for the greater glory of God. They meant no harm."

PS. I went to a Jesuit school.

The Sparrow ..Mary Russell

[Stuart M]

Two from my favourite American novel:

Dear Mrs., Mr., Miss, or Mr. And Mrs. Daneeka: Words cannot express the deep personal grief I experienced when your husband, son, father, or brother was killed, wounded, or reported missing in action.

Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to.

[DQueen]

Washington Square by Henry James

"She ordered a cup of tea, which proved excessively bad, and this gave her a sense that she was suffering in a romantic cause."