Famous Quotes & Sayings

Anna Quindlen

the more humdrum aspects of life do not make for gripping reading. To render them compelling, a writer must describe the universal in eloquent and evocative prose. Alas, Frey's writing suggests that this was not an option, and he came up with something else.

Anna Quindlen

Uncontrollable consumerism has become a watchword of our culture despite regular and compelling calls for its end. The United States has more malls than high schools; Americans spend more time shopping than reading. ... Some of the most insightful writing about the American character over the nation's history has been about neither freedom nor democracy but about the crazed impulse to acquire things.

Anna Quindlen

A finished person is a boring person.

Angelina Grimke

I have not placed reading before praying because I regard it more important, but because, in order to pray aright, we must understand what we are praying for.

Chuck Yeager

At 42,000' in approximately level flight, a third cylinder was turned on. Acceleration was rapid and speed increased to .98 Mach. The needle of the machmeter fluctuated at this reading momentarily, then passed off the scale. Assuming that the off-scale reading remained linear, it is estimated that 1.05 Mach was attained at this time.

Alfred Hitchcock

The paperback is very interesting but I find it will never replace the hardcover book - it makes a very poor doorstop.

Angela Carter

F.R. Leavis's "eat up your broccoli" approach to fiction emphasises this junkfood/wholefood dichotomy. If reading a novel--for theeighteenth century reader, the most frivolous of diversions--did not, by the middle of the twentieth century, make you a better person in some way, then you might as well flush the offending volume down the toilet, which was by far the best place for the undigested excreta of dubious nourishment.

Amy Tan

The forbidden things were a great influence on my life. I was forbidden from reading A Catcher in the Rye.

Alonzo Church

I tried reading Hilbert. Only his papers published in mathematical periodicals were available at the time. Anybody who has tried those knows they are very hard reading.

Anthony Burgess

The possession of a book becomes a substitute for reading it.

Anthony Bourdain

Margarine? That's not food. I Can't Believe It's Not Butter? I can. If you're planning on using margarine in anything, you can stop reading now, because I won't be able to help you.

Andy Samberg

We started out on the Internet, so I've been reading what people had to say about stuff since we were getting mean comments on iFilm, before we even had our site going. People are really, really rough on the web - that's their right, that's the whole point of it - but sometimes it can be a little bit brutal.

Andy Serkis

I love, first of all, reading and discovering what the common perception is and then trying to figure out... well, how does your life cross over into that character, or what's an angle on this that might challenge the status quo? It's just a great journey as well as an education. You're constantly being educated - it's like I'm back at school and making up for lost time.

Andre Holland

Things maybe take longer usually when it comes to TV - especially network TV. There are usually multiple levels that you have to go through in terms of the casting director, the producers, the studio, the network, reading with other people.

Andre Benjamin

I don't mind opinions, because you like something or you don't like something, but to say things about your personal life? I'm like, "Man, let me quit reading this. 'Cause I'll stab everybody."

Andre Gide

I would like the events never to be told directly by the author, but rather to be introduced (and several times, from various angles) by those among the characters on whom they will have had any effect. I would like those events, in the account they will make of them, to appear slightly distorted; a kind of interest stems, for the reader, from the simple fact that he should need to restore. The story requires his collaboration in order to properly take shape.

Ann Patchett

No matter how much we love a book, the experience of reading it isn't complete until we can give it to someone who will love it as much as we do

Ann Patchett

Reading fiction is important. It is a vital means of imagining a life other than our own, which in turn makes us more empathetic beings. Following complex story lines stretches our brains beyond the 140 characters of sound-bite thinking, and staying within the world of a novel gives us the ability to be quiet and alone, two skills that are disappearing faster than the polar icecaps.

Aneurin Bevan

Reading is not a duty, and has consequently no business to be made disagreeable.

Ang Lee

There's a certain time in the core of making a movie from pre-production to halfway through post-production I don't read any project, my agent will tell people that "he's not reading." And then when I know how the movie's probably gonna work halfway into post-production, I'll come along.

Anatole France

There are no bad books any more than there are ugly women.

Amanda Peet

The thing I noticed about Jack was when we did a reading of the script, just to warm up.

Alvin Toffler

Knowledge is knowing... or knowing where to find out.

Anne Fadiman

Reading aloud means no skipping, no skimming, no cutting to the chase.

Anne Graham Lotz

Anything John Stott says is worth listening to. Anything he writes is worth reading. Basic Christianity is not only a classic must-read for every believer; it is truly a blessing preserved on the written page for the enrichment of this generation and those to come.

Anne Hathaway

It's definitely a thing to be sitting there, getting a pedicure, and you look over and someone is reading an article about an aspect of your life that you know is not true. It's weird, it's uncomfortable, but I don't see it changing anytime soon, so I should figure a way to laugh through it.

Anne Frank

This week I've been reading a lot and doing little work. That's the way things ought to be. That's surely the road to success.

Rita Dove

There are distinct duties of a poet laureate. I plan a reading series at the Library of Congress and advise the librarian. The rest is how I want to promote poetry

Rita Dove

I think reading Shakespeare's plays when I was young was extremely important. He had the ability to make utter strangers come alive.

Rita Dove

If they don't read, if they don't love reading; if they don't find themselves compulsively reading, I don't think they're really a writer

Rick Moody

I read a lot of The Canterbury Tales on my phone, because I was cycling between three different editions, and I needed to have a middle-of-the-night edition for the insomniac reading.

Rick Moody

There is no right or wrong reading of Naked Lunch, though some readings are more common, and thus Burroughs commercial is not the issue.

Thomas Ian Nicholas

Whenever I'm doing any film, there's always three different things. There's the script, which is really just a blueprint. And then, you shoot the movie and it's an entirely different experience than you would expect from reading the script. And then, there's the whole post process and the editing, and it becomes something else entirely.