Shapes Quotes - Page 27

• I look up, and stop breathing. Eyes glitter in the darkness. Dark shapes sit in the car, more numerous than we are. The factionless.

  Veronica Roth

  Eye, Dark, Breathing

  4 Copy quote

• She opened her mouth to answer, but he was already kissing her. She had kissed him so many times—soft gentle kisses, hard and desperate ones, brief brushes of the lips that said good-bye, and kisses that seemed to go on for hours—and this was no different. The way the memory of someone who had once lived in a house might linger even after they were gone, like a sort of psychic imprint, her body remembered Jace. Remembered the way he tasted, the slant of his mouth over hers, his scars under her fingers, the shape of his body under her hands.

  Cassandra Clare

  Memories, Kissing, Bye

  Cassandra Clare (2014). “City of Lost Souls”, p.231, Simon and Schuster

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Your ability to shape your destiny is directly proportional to your belief that it is a matter of will and determination--however much or little that belief may be.

  James A. Owen

  Determination, Destiny, May

  4 Copy quote

• Geography is the key, the crucial accident of birth. A piece of protein could be a snail, a sea lion, or a systems analyst, but it had to start somewhere. This is not science; it is merely metaphor. And the landscape in which the protein "starts" shapes its end as surely as bowls shape water.

  Annie Dillard

  Keys, Sea, Water

  Annie Dillard (2016). “Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters”, p.92, Canongate Books

  20 Copy quote

  Show source

• There was only silence. It was the silence of matter caught in the act and embarrassed. There were no cells moving, and yet there were cells. I could see the shape of the land, how it lay holding silence. Its poise and its stillness were unendurable, like the ring of the silence you hear in your skull when you're little and notice you're living the ring which resumes later in life when you're sick.

  Annie Dillard

  Moving, Later In Life, Cells

  4 Copy quote

• You can break a thing, but you cannot always guide it afterward into the shape you want.

  Holly Black

  Want, Break, Guides

  Holly Black (2008). “Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale”, p.183, Simon and Schuster

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• If I commit suicide, it will not be to destroy myself, but to put myself back together again. Suicide will be for me only one means of violently reconquering myself, of brutally invading my being, of anticipating the unpredictable approaches of God. By suicide, I reintroduce my design in nature, I shall for the first time give things the shape of my will.

  Antonin Artaud

  Suicide, Self Harm, Suicidal

  Antonin Artaud, Jack Hirschman (1963). “Artaud Anthology”, p.56, City Lights Books

  28 Copy quote

  Show source

• The great obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents, and the oceans was not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge.

  Daniel J. Boorstin

  Ocean, Ignorance, Knowledge

  "The Discoverers: A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself (Knowledge Trilogy, Book 1)". Book by Daniel J. Boorstin, 1983.

  16 Copy quote

  Show source

• We are stratified creatures, creatures full of abysses, with a soul of inconstant quicksilver, with a mind whose color and shape change as in a kaleidoscope that is constantly shaken.

  Pascal Mercier

  Color, Soul, Mind

  Pascal Mercier (2008). “Night Train to Lisbon: A Novel”, p.334, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

  29 Copy quote

  Show source

• He was beautiful, that was always affirmed, but his beauty was hard to fix or to see, for he was always glimmering, flickering, melting, mixing, he was the shape of a shapeless flame, he was the eddying thread of needle-shapes in the shapeless mass of the waterfall. He was the invisible wind that hurried the clouds in billows and ribbons. You could see a bare tree on the skyline bent by the wind, holding up twisted branches and bent twigs, and suddenly its formless form would resolve itself into that of the trickster.

  A. S. Byatt

  Beautiful, Clouds, Flames

  A.S. Byatt (2011). “Ragnarok: the End of the Gods”, p.28, Canongate Books

  23 Copy quote

  Show source

• Granny Weatherwaz was a witch. That was quite acceptable in the Ramtops, and no one had a bad word to say about witches. At least, not if he wanted to wake up in the morning the same shape as he went to bed.

  Terry Pratchett

  Morning, Bed, Wake Up

  Terry Pratchett (2012). “The Wit and Wisdom of Discworld”, p.21, Harper Collins

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• HOUSE RULES [at the Praetor Lupus Headquarters] No shape-shifting in the hallways. No howling. No silver. Clothing must be worn at all times. ALL TIMES. No fighting. No biting. Mark all your food before you put it in the communal refrigerator.

  Cassandra Clare

  Fighting, House, Biting

  7 Copy quote

• I am a fragment of a mirror whose whole design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have - I can reflect light into the dark places of this world - into the black places in the hearts of men - and change somethings in some people. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life.

  Robert Fulghum

  Heart, Dark, Men

  Robert Fulghum (1999). “Robert Fulghum's All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten”, p.99, Dramatic Publishing

  40 Copy quote

  Show source

• Algaliarept varied its shape, sifting through my mind without me even knowing to choose what scared me the most. Once it had been Ivy. Then Kisten —until I had pinned him in an elevator in a foolish moment of vampire-induced passion. It's hard to be scared of someone after you've French-kissed him.

  Kim Harrison

  Passion, Ivy, Knowing

  Kim Harrison (2010). “Every Which Way But Dead”, p.5, HarperCollins UK

  52 Copy quote

  Show source

• Schwartz's research suggests something important: we can stretch our personalities, but only up to a point. Our inborn temperaments influence us, regardless of the lives we lead. A sizeable part of who we are is ordained by our genes, by our brains, by our nervous systems. And yet the elasticity that Schwartz found in some of the high-reactive teens also suggests the converse: we have free will and can use it to shape our personalities.

  Susan Cain

  Personality, Brain, Important

  4 Copy quote

• Hey,” the other said, coming to life. “You’re supposed to be in jail.” Al grinned at him, his white-gloved grip tightening on the wooden handle, which was intricately carved in the shape of a naked, writhing woman. Nice. “And your momma wanted you to have a brain,” he said, yanking the door open and slamming it into the guy’s face.

  Kim Harrison

  Nice, Doors, White

  4 Copy quote

• You existed. You existed now as a fractal. Definition: A fractal is generally a rough or fragmented geometric shape that can be broken into parts, each of which is (at least approximately) a reduced-size copy of the whole. Maybe I was a fractal. Maybe the photographer was a fractal. Maybe we were all fractals.

  David Levithan

  Geometric Shapes, Broken, Definitions

  28 Copy quote

• He looked at the little maiden, and she looked at him; and he felt that he was melting away, but he still managed to keep himself erect, shouldering his gun bravely. A door was suddenly opened, the draught caught the little dancer and she fluttered like a sylph, straight into the fire, to the soldier, blazed up and was gone! By this time the soldier was reduced to a mere lump, and when the maid took away the ashes next morning she found him, in the shape of a small tin heart. All that was left of the dancer was her spangle, and that was burnt as black as a coal.

  Hans Christian Andersen

  Morning, Heart, Gun

  Hans Christian Andersen (1993). “Andersen's Fairy Tales”, p.103, Wordsworth Editions

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• There’s a morning when presence comes over your soul. You sing like a rooster in your earth-colored shape. Your heart hears and, no longer frantic, begins to dance.

  Rumi

  Spiritual, Morning, Heart

  27 Copy quote

• The idea was to have a basin inverted on his head and his hair cut to the shape of it. Skill and money were not needed. Then the idea grew that it was more convenient to leave the basin on his head. Stray thoughts were trimmed along with stray hair; brain-vines, tentacles of thought, were not encouraged to wander. Then, in the interests of human economy, the head of adaptable man became a basin of uniform shape—a basin, a crash helmet. Safe at last; no more thought-cuts.

  Janet Frame

  Cutting, Men, Hair

  4 Copy quote

• Majority decisions tend to be made without engaging the systematic thought and critical thinking skills of the individuals in the group. Given the force of the group's normative power to shape the opinions of the followers who conform without thinking things through, they are often taken at face value. The persistent minority forces the others to process the relevant information more mindfully. Research shows that the deciscions of a group as a whole are more thoughtful and creative when there is minority dissent than when it is absent.

  Philip Zimbardo

  Taken, Thoughtful, Thinking

  22 Copy quote

• Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it.

  Steven Pressfield

  Jobs, Destiny, Life Is

  "The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles". Book by Steven Pressfield, www.huffingtonpost.com. 2002.

  20 Copy quote

  Show source

• We love the imperfect shapes in nature and in the works of art, look for an intentional error as a sign of the golden key and sincerity found in true mastery.

  Dejan Stojanovic

  Art, Errors, Keys

  "Mastery". Poem by Dejan Stojanovic, www.poemhunter.com.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• If more Africans had eaten missionaries, the continent would be in better shape.

  Maya Angelou

  Life Changing, Would Be, Continents

  "35 Maya Angelou Quotes That Changed My Life" by J.N. Salters, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 29, 2014.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• It's an honor and privilege to be next to the great mysteries, and that's what I get to do every day. Why are we here? How beautiful the Earth is. Whatever it is, large and small. There's so much that's beautiful and moving and sad, to experience that and find shapes for it, to deeply enter that meditative space. There's nothing like it. Everything else seems so pale.

  Carole Maso

  Beautiful, Moving, Space

  8 Copy quote