What's the most bautiful thing (image, piece of text, etc.) you ever read?

[kiki1982]

I thought this would be rather inspiring... In order to maybe make other people read that book you love...

Here is mine:
It is from Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, and is taken from the Fifth Part Jean Valjean, Sixth Book The white Night, Chapter II Jean Valjean has his arm still wrapped.
It is the part about the wedding night of Marius and Cosette. The first time I read it I was really struck about the tone, the style and the image Hugo took to describe the wedding night. It was a touching image Hugo made. I couldn't read on for a while until I had got over it.

I had to translate it myself, so please excuse any mistakes in the translation, although I did my best.

The soul comes in contemplation before this sanctuary where this celebration of love takes place.
There must be a glow above those houses. The happiness they have within them must be able to escape as light through the stones of their walls, and beam vaguely in the darkness. It is impossible that this blessed and fatal feast would not send an angelic glow to infinity. Love is the sublime place where the fusion of man and woman takes place; one being, three beings, a final being, human trinity comes out of it. This birth of two souls in one must be an emotion to limelight. The love is a priest; the ecstatic virgin is overjoyed. Some of this happiness goes to God. There where there is a real marriage, there where there is love, the ideal is as well. A marriage bed makes a corner of morning light in the darkness of night. If it was given to the eye to see the hesitation and charming visions of superior life, it is probable that one would be able to see the forms of night, the winged unknown beings, the blue passers-by of the invisible, coming in crowds of sombre heads, around the luminous house, satisfied, blessing, showing to each other the married virgin, softly touched, and they would have the reflection of human happiness on their divine faces. If, in this supreme hour, the lovers, who think themselves alone, listened, they would be able to hear in their room the sound of wings. Perfect happiness brings angels. This little obscure alcove has the heavens for a ceiling. When two mouths, become sacred because of love, come together to create, it is impossible that above this kiss there is no trembling in the immense mystery of the stars.
This happiness is real. There is no joy out of this love. Love is the only ecstasy. All the rest weeps.
To love or to be loved, that is all that matters. Do not ask for anything more after. One cannot have to find another pearl the dark folds of life, than this one. To love is an accomplishment.


I hope you enjoyed it, and hopefully there is more to come.

[kelby_lake]

Beauty is always the result of an accident. Of a violent lapse between acquired habits and those yet to be acquired.

Jean Cocteau. I just liked it.

[Chester]

Nice topic. I would have to say the most beautiful thing I have read is "Dark Night of the Soul" by St. John of the Cross (1585) about a soul's union with God. Beautiful poem of love, made more beautiful by the subject matter, in my estimation. Full of wonderful metaphor and symbolism.


1. One dark night,
fired with love's urgent longings
- ah, the sheer grace! -
I went out unseen,
my house being now all stilled.

2. In darkness, and secure,
by the secret ladder, disguised,
- ah, the sheer grace! -
in darkness and concealment,
my house being now all stilled.

3. On that glad night,
in secret, for no one saw me,
nor did I look at anything,
with no other light or guide
than the one that burned in my heart.

4. This guided me
more surely than the light of noon
to where he was awaiting me
- him I knew so well -
there in a place where no one appeared.

5. O guiding night!
O night more lovely than the dawn!
O night that has united
the Lover with his beloved,
transforming the beloved in her Lover.

6. Upon my flowering breast
which I kept wholly for him alone,
there he lay sleeping,
and I caressing him
there in a breeze from the fanning cedars.

7. When the breeze blew from the turret,
as I parted his hair,
it wounded my neck
with its gentle hand,
suspending all my senses.

8. I abandoned and forgot myself,
laying my face on my Beloved;
all things ceased; I went out from myself,
leaving my cares
forgotten among the lilies.

[patrickbeverley]

Fern Hill

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
Trail with daisies and barley
Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
In the sun that is young once only,
Time let me play and be
Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
And the sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
And playing, lovely and watery
And fire green as grass.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
Flying with the ricks, and the horses
Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the **** on his shoulder: it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
Out of the whinnying green stable
On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
In the sun born over and over,
I ran my heedless ways,
My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

Dylan Thomas

[Pecksie]

I thought this would be rather inspiring... In order to maybe make other people read that book you love...

Here is mine:
It is from Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, and is taken from the Fifth Part Jean Valjean, Sixth Book The white Night, Chapter II Jean Valjean has his arm still wrapped.
It is the part about the wedding night of Marius and Cosette. The first time I read it I was really struck about the tone, the style and the image Hugo took to describe the wedding night. It was a touching image Hugo made. I couldn't read on for a while until I had got over it.


I've always been very moved by another scene from Les Misérables, the dialogue between the bishop and the dying conventionary. I can't quote verbatim, but I've always felt a lump in my throat when the bishop mentions the king's murdered son, and the revolutionary says they should weep for all suffering children - "I will weep with you for the children of kings, provided that you weep with me for the children of the people". To which the bishop replies: "I weep for all". And the dying man says: "If the balance must incline, let it be on the side of the people - they have been suffering longer".

[johann cruyff]

My signature :)

[amalia1985]

From Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte.
Chapter XVI, the moment when Nellie informs Heathcliff of Catherine's death, and his reply:

" May she woke in torment!", he cried, with frightful vehemence, stamping his foot, and groaning in a sudden paroxysm of ungovernable passion. "Why, she's a liar to the end! Where is she? Not there- not in heaven- not perished- where? Oh! You said you cared nothing for my sufferings! And I pray one prayer- I repeat it till my tongue stiffens- Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living! You said I killed you- haunt me, then! The murdered do[I] haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts [I]have wondered on earth. Be with me always- take any form- drive me mad! Only do not lleave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!"

[raider60]

From Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte.
Chapter XVI, the moment when Nellie informs Heathcliff of Catherine's death, and his reply:

" May she woke in torment!", he cried, with frightful vehemence, stamping his foot, and groaning in a sudden paroxysm of ungovernable passion. "Why, she's a liar to the end! Where is she? Not there- not in heaven- not perished- where? Oh! You said you cared nothing for my sufferings! And I pray one prayer- I repeat it till my tongue stiffens- Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living! You said I killed you- haunt me, then! The murdered do[I] haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts [I]have wondered on earth. Be with me always- take any form- drive me mad! Only do not lleave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!"

Good stuff here--

[Dori]

One of my favorite passages (I prefer the Garnett translation--of this passage especially--but another is provided for those who particularly dislike Garnett's translations):


THE IDIOT by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Excerpted from Part II, Chapter V


Eva Martin's Translation

This must be thought out; it was clear that there had been no hallucination at the station then, either; something had actually happened to him, on both occasions; there was no doubt of it. But again a loathing for all mental exertion overmastered him; he would not think it out now, he would put it off and think of something else. He remembered that during his epileptic fits, or rather immediately preceding them, he had always experienced a moment or two when his whole heart, and mind, and body seemed to wake up to vigour and light; when he became filled with joy and hope, and all his anxieties seemed to be swept away for ever; these moments were but presentiments, as it were, of the one final second (it was never more than a second) in which the fit came upon him. That second, of course, was inexpressible. When his attack was over, and the prince reflected on his symptoms, he used to say to himself: "These moments, short as they are, when I feel such extreme consciousness of myself, and consequently more of life than at other times, are due only to the disease—to the sudden rupture of normal conditions. Therefore they are not really a higher kind of life, but a lower." This reasoning, however, seemed to end in a paradox, and lead to the further consideration:—"What matter though it be only disease, an abnormal tension of the brain, if when I recall and analyze the moment, it seems to have been one of harmony and beauty in the highest degree—an instant of deepest sensation, overflowing with unbounded joy and rapture, ecstatic devotion, and completest life?" Vague though this sounds, it was perfectly comprehensible to Muishkin, though he knew that it was but a feeble expression of his sensations.

That there was, indeed, beauty and harmony in those abnormal moments, that they really contained the highest synthesis of life, he could not doubt, nor even admit the possibility of doubt. He felt that they were not analogous to the fantastic and unreal dreams due to intoxication by hashish, opium or wine. Of that he could judge, when the attack was over. These instants were characterized—to define it in a word—by an intense quickening of the sense of personality. Since, in the last conscious moment preceding the attack, he could say to himself, with full understanding of his words: "I would give my whole life for this one instant," then doubtless to him it really was worth a lifetime. For the rest, he thought the dialectical part of his argument of little worth; he saw only too clearly that the result of these ecstatic moments was stupefaction, mental darkness, idiocy. No argument was possible on that point. His conclusion, his estimate of the "moment," doubtless contained some error, yet the reality of the sensation troubled him. What's more unanswerable than a fact? And this fact had occurred. The prince had confessed unreservedly to himself that the feeling of intense beatitude in that crowded moment made the moment worth a lifetime. "I feel then," he said one day to Rogojin in Moscow, "I feel then as if I understood those amazing words—'There shall be no more time.'" And he added with a smile: "No doubt the epileptic Mahomet refers to that same moment when he says that he visited all the dwellings of Allah, in less time than was needed to empty his pitcher of water." Yes, he had often met Rogojin in Moscow, and many were the subjects they discussed. "He told me I had been a brother to him," thought the prince. "He said so today, for the first time."
Constance Garnett's Translation

[...] It was clear now that it had not been his imagination at the station either, that something real must have happened to him, and that it must be overcome again by a sort of insuperable inner loathing: he did not want to think anything out, and he did not; he fell to musing on something quite different.

He remembered among other things that he always had one minute just before the epileptic fit (if it came on while he was awake), when suddenly in the midst of sadness, spiritual darkness and oppression, there seemed at moments a flash of light in his brain, and with extraordinary impetus all his vital forces suddenly began working at their highest tension. The sense of life, the consciousness of self, were multiplied ten times at these moments which passed like a flash of lightning. His mind and his heart were flooded with extraordinary light; all his uneasiness, all his doubts, all his anxieties were relieved at once; they were all merged in a lofty calm, full of serene, harmonious joy and hope. But these moments, these flashes, were only the prelude of that final second (it was never more than a second) with which the fit began. That second was, of course, unendurable. Thinking of that moment later, when he was all right again, he often said himself that all these gleams and flashes of the highest sensation of life and self-consciousness, and therefore also of the highest form of existence, were nothing but disease, the interruption of the normal conditions; and if so, uit was not at all the highest form of being, but on the contrary must be counted the lowest. And yet he came at last to an extremely paradoical conclusion. "What if it is disease?" he decided at last. "what does it matter that it is an abnormal intensity, if the result, if the minute of sensation, remembered and analyzed afterwards in health, turns out to be the acme of harmony and beauty, and gives a feeling, unknown and undivined till then, of completeness, of proportion, of reconciliation, and of ecstatic devotional merging in the highest synthesis of life?" These vague expressions seemed to him very comprehensible, though too weak. That it reall was "beauty and worship," that it really was the "highest synthesis of life" he could not doubt, and could not admit the possibility of doubt. It was not as though he saw abnormal and unreal visions of some sort at that moment, as from hashish, opium, or wine, destroying the reason and distorting the soul. He was quite capable of judging of that when the attack was over. These moments were only and extraordinary quickening of self-consciousness--if the condition was to be expressed in one word--and at the same time of the direct sensation of existence in the most intense degree. Since at that second, that is at the very last conscious moment before the fit, he had time to say to himself clearly and consciously, "Yes, for this moment one might give one's whole life!" then without doubt that moment was really worth the whole of life. He did not insist on the dialectical part of his argument, however. Stupefaction, spiritual darkness, idiocy, stood before him conspicuously as the consequence of these "higher moments"; seriously, of course, he could not have disputed it. There was undoubtedly a mistake in his conclusion--that is, in his estimate of that minute, but the reality of the sensation somewhat perplexed him. What was he to make of that reality? For the very thing had happened; he actually had said to himself at that second that, for the infinite happiness he had felt in it, that second really might well be worth the whole of life. "At that moment," Rogozhin one day in Moscow at the time when they used to meet there, "at that moment I seem somehow to understand the extraordinary saying that there shall be no more time. Probably," he added, smiling, "this is the very second which was not long enough for the water to be spilt out of Muhammad's pitcher, though the epileptic prophet had time to gaze at all the habitations of Allah."

[PeterL]

I have ever hated all Nations professions and Communityes and all my love is towards individuals for instance I hate the tribe of Lawyers, but I love Councellor such a one, Judge such a one for so with Physicians (I will not Speak of my own Trade) Soldiers, English, Scotch, French; and the rest but pricipally I hate and detest that animal called man, although I hartily love John, Peter, Thomas and so forth. this is the system upon which I have governed my self many years
Swift to Alexander Pope

29 September 1725

[lavendar1]

That night he dreamt of horses in a field on a high plain where the spring rains had brought up the grass and the wildflowers out of the ground and the flowers ran all blue and yellow as far as the eye could see and in the dream he was among the horses running and in the dream he himself could run with the horses and they coursed the young mares and fillies over the plain where their rich bay and their rich chestnut colors shone in the sun and the young colts ran with the dames and trampled down the flowers in a haze of pollen that hung in the sun like powdered gold and they ran he and the horses out along the high mesas where the ground resounded under their running hooves and they flowed and changed and ran and their manes and tails blew off of them like spume and there was nothing else at all in that high world and they moved all of them in a resonance that was like a music among them and they were none of them afraid nor colt nor mare and they ran in that resonance which is the world itself and which cannot be spoken but only praised.

-- Cormac McCarthy, All the Pretty Horses

[patrickbeverley]

Love the Dostoevsky.

[jaywalker]

''Promise to pay the Bearer''. I've read it many times and it never palls.

[Pecksie]

Swift to Alexander Pope

29 September 1725

Let me offer this very wise quote from Dr. Johnson in defense of lawyers :):

"Consider, sir; what is the purpose of the courts of justice? It is, that every man may have his cause fairly tried, by men appointed to try causes. A lawyer is not to tell what he knows to be a false deed; but he is not to usurp the province of the jury and of the judge, and determine what shall be the effect of evidence -- what shall be the result of legal argument. As it rarely happens that is fit to plead his own cause, lawyers are a class of the community, who, by study and experience, have acquired the art and power of arranging evidence, and of applying to the points of issue what the law has settled. A lawyer is to do for his client all that his client might fairly do for himself, if he could. If, by a superiority of attention, of knowledge, of skill, and a better method of communication, he has the advantage of his adversary, it is an advantage to which he is entitled. There must always be some advantage, on one side or the other; and it is better that advantage should be had by talents, than by chance. If lawyers were to undertake no causes till they were sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from a trial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined, it might be a very just claim".

(Boswell, Life of Johnson)

[stlukesguild]

I don't think I could come up with a single "most beautiful" passage in literature... although I can think of a number. Milton's Paradise Lost is laden with some of the most exquisite passages in all of literature. The sensuality of the visual descriptions is perhaps all the more poignant when one realizes that the author is himself blind. One particular passage I admire deals directly with his blindness, as Milton tells of his own inner "sight":

Thus with the Year
Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of Ev'n or Morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or Summers Rose,
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;
But cloud in stead, and ever-during dark
Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men
Cut off, and for the book of knowledg fair
Presented with a Universal blanc
Of Natures works to mee expung'd and ras'd,
And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out.
So much the rather thou Celestial light
Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers
Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight.

In book VIII Milton has Adam describe Eve:

The Rib he formd and fashond with his hands;
Under his forming hands a Creature grew,
Manlike, but different sex, so lovly faire,
That what seemd fair in all the World, seemd now
Mean, or in her summd up, in her containd
And in her looks, which from that time infus'd
Sweetness into my heart, unfelt before,
And into all things from her Aire inspir'd
The spirit of love and amorous delight...

Grace was in all her steps, Heav'n in her Eye,
In every gesture dignitie and love...

To the Nuptial Bowre
I led her blushing like the Morn: all Heav'n,
And happie Constellations on that houre
Shed thir selectest influence; the Earth
Gave sign of gratulation, and each Hill;
Joyous the Birds; fresh Gales and gentle Aires
Whisper'd it to the Woods, and from thir wings
Flung Rose, flung Odours from the spicie Shrub,
Disporting, till the amorous Bird of Night
Sung Spousal, and bid haste the Eevning Starr
On his Hill top, to light the bridal Lamp.
Thus I have told thee all my State, and brought
My Storie to the sum of earthly bliss...

As a visual artist I am drawn to literature that that is greatly sensual and descriptive of the senses... sight, sound, smell. This is probably the reason I read far more poetry than novels... although certainly not exclusively. Among such literature I immediately think of Proust, of Gautier's short tales, of Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Verlaine and the rest of the French Symbolists. I would certainly add to these the great English Renaissance writers. Shakespeare is obvious and I wouldn't know where to start... but also Robert Herrick. He's a master of the miniature... rather like those Elizabethan cameos. (Its only fitting that my collection of his poems is itself a miniature volume.) He's all flowers, perfume and other sweet scents, gems, and beautiful women. His touch is exquisitely light... "precious" in the finest sense of the world. "The Vine" has ever had me smile... if not burst out into laughter.

"To His Mistresses"

Put on your silks; and piece by piece
Give them the scent of Amber-Greece:
And for your breaths too, let them smell
Ambrosia-like, or Nectarell:
While other Gums their sweets perspire,
By your owne jewels set on fire.


"Delight in Disorder"

A sweet disorder in the dresse
Kindles in clothes a wantonesse:
A Lawne about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction:
An erring lace which here and there
Enthralls the Crimson stomacher:
A Cuffe, neglectfull, and thereby
Ribbands to flow confusedly:
A winning wave (desrving Note)
In the tempestuous Petticote:
A carelesse shooes-string, in whose tye
I see a wilde civility:
Doe more bewitch me, than when Art
Is too precise in every part.


"The Shooe Tying"

Anthea bade me tye her shooe;
I did, and kist the Instep too:
And would have kist unto her knee,
Had not her blush rebuked me.


"Upon Julia's Clothes"

Whenas in silks my Julia goes,
Then, then, methinks, how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free,
O how that glittering taketh me!


"The Vine"

I dreamed this mortal part of mine
Was Metamorphoz'd to a Vine;
Which crawling one and every way,
Enthralled my dainty Lucia.
Me thought, her long small legs and thighs
I with my Tendrills did surprize:
Her Belly, Buttocks, and her Waste
By my soft Nerv'lits were embraced:
About her head I writhing hung
And with rich clusters (hid among
the leaves) her Temples I behung:
So that my Lucia seemed to me
Young Bacchus ravisht by his tree.
My curles about her necke did craule,
And armes and hands they did enthraull:
So that she could not freely stir,
(All parts there made one prisoner.)
But when I crept with leaves to hide
those parts, which maides keep unespy'd
Such fleeting pleasure there I took
That with the fancie, I awook;
And found (Ah me!) this flesh of mine
More like a Stock than like a Vine.

Perhaps the most absolute example of sensual joy and beauty (also from and English Renaissance poet) that comes to my mind must surely be found in Edmund Spenser's Epithalamion or his wedding poem in celebration of his own marriage to Elizabeth Boyle, which followed the equally exquisite series of sonnets or Amoretti. While series of sonnets written to an unattainable love who continues to disdain the poet was a conceit of Renaissance poets from Dante and Petrarch on, Spencer raises this to an entirely new level. His love is quite real, and his sonnets document the very real courtship of Elizabeth Boyle, the future Lady Spencer. The cycle follows their evolving love... beginning with her disdainful and mocking rejection, through a growing respect, and blossoming forth into love. Spenser presents a woman as a intelligent thinking being, a worthy partner who is more than just physically beautiful... although he certainly sees that in her as well. This cycle of sonnets, second only (perhaps) to Shakespeare's, was crowned with the Epithalamion, or joyous wedding song. It is hard to imagine a greater expression of absolute joy and bliss found upon one's wedding day (selected quotes):

Bring with you all the nymphes that you can heare,
Both of the rivers and the forrests greene,
And of the sea that neighbours to her neare,
All with gay girlands goodly wel beseene*. 40
And let them also with them bring in hand
Another gay girland,
For my fayre Love, of lillyes and of roses,
Bound truelove wize with a blew silke riband.
And let them make great store of bridale poses, 45
And let them eke bring store of other flowers,
To deck the bridale bowers:
And let the ground whereas her foot shall tread,
For feare the stones her tender foot should wrong,
Be strewd with fragrant flowers all along, 50
And diapred lyke the discolored mead.
Which done, doe at her chamber dore awayt,
For she will waken strayt;
The whiles do ye this song unto her sing,
The woods shall to you answer, and your eccho ring;...

Wake now, my Love, awake! for it is time:
The rosy Morne long since left Tithons bed, 75
All ready to her silver coche to clyme,
And Phoebus gins to shew his glorious hed.
Hark! how the cheerefull birds do chaunt theyr laies,
And carroll of Loves praise:
The merry larke hir mattins sings aloft; 80
The thrush replyes; the mavis* descant** playes;
The ouzell@ shrills; the ruddock$ warbles soft;
So goodly all agree, with sweet consent,
To this dayes meriment.
Ah! my deere Love, why doe ye sleepe thus long, 85
When meeter were that ye should now awake,
T'awayt the comming of your ioyous make,%
And hearken to the birds love-learned song,
The deawy leaves among!
For they of ioy and pleasance to you sing, 90
That all the woods them answer, and theyr eccho ring.

My love is now awake out of her dreame,
And her fayre eyes, like stars that dimmed were
With darksome cloud, now shew theyr goodly beams
More bright then Hesperus his head doth rere. 95
Come now, ye damzels, daughters of delight,
Helpe quickly her to dight.
But first come, ye fayre Houres, which were begot,
In Ioves sweet paradice, of Day and Night,
Which doe the seasons of the year allot, 100
And all that ever in this world is fayre
Do make and still repayre:
And ye three handmayds of the Cyprian Queene,
The which doe still adorn her beauties pride,
Helpe to adorne my beautifullest bride: 105
And, as ye her array, still throw betweene
Some graces to be scene;
And, as ye use to Venus, to her sing,
The whiles the woods shal answer, and your eccho ring...

Loe! where she comes along with portly pace,
Lyke Phoebe, from her chamber of the East,
Arysing forth to run her mighty race, 150
Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best.
So well it her beseems, that ye would weene
Some angell she had beene.
Her long loose yellow locks lyke golden wyre,
Sprinckled with perle, and perling flowres atweene,
Doe lyke a golden mantle her attyre, 156
And, being crowned with a girland greene,
Seem lyke some mayden queene.
Her modest eyes, abashed to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare, 160
Upon the lowly ground affixed are,
Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold,
But blush to heare her prayses sung so loud,--
So farre from being proud.
Nathlesse doe ye still loud her prayses sing, 165
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Open the temple gates unto my Love,
Open them wide that she may enter in, 205
And all the postes adorne as doth behove,
And all the pillours deck with girlands trim,
For to receyve this saynt with honour dew,
That commeth in to you.
With trembling steps and humble reverence, 210
She commeth in before th'Almighties view:
Of her, ye virgins, learne obedience,
When so ye come into those holy places,
To humble your proud faces.
Bring her up to th'high altar, that she may 215
The sacred ceremonies there partake,
The which do endlesse matrimony make;
And let the roring organs loudly play
The praises of the Loi'd in lively notes;
The whiles, with hollow throates, 220
The choristers the ioyous antheme sing,
That all the woods may answer, and their eccho ring...

Behold, whiles she before the altar stands,
Hearing the holy priest that to her speakes
And blesseth her with his two happy hands, 225
How the red roses flush up in her cheekes,
And the pure snow with goodly vermill stayne,
Like crimsin dyde in grayne:
That even the angels, which continually
About the sacred altar doe remaine, 230
Forget their service and about her fly,
Ofte peeping in her face, that seems more fayre
The more they on it stare.
But her sad* eyes, still fastened on the ground,
Are governed with goodly modesty, 235
That suffers not one look to glaunce awry,
Which may let in a little thought unsownd.
Why blush ye, Love, to give to me your hand,
The pledge of all our band?
Sing, ye sweet angels, Alleluya sing, 240
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Ring ye the bels, ye yong men of the towne,
And leave your wonted labors for this day:
This day is holy; doe ye write it downe,
That ye for ever it remember may.
This day the sunne is in his chiefest hight,
With Barnaby the bright*,
From whence declining daily by degrees,
He somewhat loseth of his heat and light,
When once the Crab behind his back he sees.
But for this time it ill ordained was,
To choose the longest day in all the yeare,
And shortest night, when longest fitter weare:
Yet never day so long, but late would passe.
Ring ye the bels to make it weare away,
And bonefiers make all day; 275
And daunce about them, and about them sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

[kelby_lake]

Christina Rossetti
Remember


REMEMBER me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

[armenian]

theres a scene in crime and punishment where the main character was a dream about watching a horse being beat and feeling helpless to stop it. if i could find the exact words i would post them, something about that scene just made me feel.

[Dori]

theres a scene in crime and punishment where the main character was a dream about watching a horse being beat and feeling helpless to stop it. if i could find the exact words i would post them, something about that scene just made me feel.

Oh yes, I recall that seen: let me see if I can locate it...

*Searches through Litnet's online text of C&P*

Ah yes, it's Chapter 5 of Part 1 (I particularly like the first paragraph; D. was quite the psychologist. It's such a great introduction to what is to follow.):


In a morbid condition of the brain, dreams often have a singular actuality, vividness, and extraordinary semblance of reality. At times monstrous images are created, but the setting and the whole picture are so truthlike and filled with details so delicate, so unexpectedly, but so artistically consistent, that the dreamer, were he an artist like Pushkin or Turgenev even, could never have invented them in the waking state. Such sick dreams always remain long in the memory and make a powerful impression on the overwrought and deranged nervous system.

Raskolnikov had a fearful dream. He dreamt he was back in his childhood in the little town of his birth. He was a child about seven years old, walking into the country with his father on the evening of a holiday. It was a grey and heavy day, the country was exactly as he remembered it; indeed he recalled it far more vividly in his dream than he had done in memory. The little town stood on a level flat as bare as the hand, not even a willow near it; only in the far distance, a copse lay, a dark blur on the very edge of the horizon. A few paces beyond the last market garden stood a tavern, a big tavern, which had always aroused in him a feeling of aversion, even of fear, when he walked by it with his father. There was always a crowd there, always shouting, laughter and abuse, hideous hoarse singing and often fighting. Drunken and horrible-looking figures were hanging about the tavern. He used to cling close to his father, trembling all over when he met them. Near the tavern the road became a dusty track, the dust of which was always black. It was a winding road, and about a hundred paces further on, it turned to the right to the graveyard. In the middle of the graveyard stood a stone church with a green cupola where he used to go to mass two or three times a year with his father and mother, when a service was held in memory of his grandmother, who had long been dead, and whom he had never seen. On these occasions they used to take on a white dish tied up in a table napkin a special sort of rice pudding with raisins stuck in it in the shape of a cross. He loved that church, the old-fashioned, unadorned ikons and the old priest with the shaking head. Near his grandmother's grave, which was marked by a stone, was the little grave of his younger brother who had died at six months old. He did not remember him at all, but he had been told about his little brother, and whenever he visited the graveyard he used religiously and reverently to cross himself and to bow down and kiss the little grave. And now he dreamt that he was walking with his father past the tavern on the way to the graveyard; he was holding his father's hand and looking with dread at the tavern. A peculiar circumstance attracted his attention: there seemed to be some kind of festivity going on, there were crowds of gaily dressed townspeople, peasant women, their husbands, and riff-raff of all sorts, all singing and all more or less drunk. Near the entrance of the tavern stood a cart, but a strange cart. It was one of those big carts usually drawn by heavy cart-horses and laden with casks of wine or other heavy goods. He always liked looking at those great cart- horses, with their long manes, thick legs, and slow even pace, drawing along a perfect mountain with no appearance of effort, as though it were easier going with a load than without it. But now, strange to say, in the shafts of such a cart he saw a thin little sorrel beast, one of those peasants' nags which he had often seen straining their utmost under a heavy load of wood or hay, especially when the wheels were stuck in the mud or in a rut. And the peasants would beat them so cruelly, sometimes even about the nose and eyes, and he felt so sorry, so sorry for them that he almost cried, and his mother always used to take him away from the window. All of a sudden there was a great uproar of shouting, singing and the balalaïka, and from the tavern a number of big and very drunken peasants came out, wearing red and blue shirts and coats thrown over their shoulders.

"Get in, get in!" shouted one of them, a young thick-necked peasant with a fleshy face red as a carrot. "I'll take you all, get in!"

But at once there was an outbreak of laughter and exclamations in the crowd.

"Take us all with a beast like that!"

"Why, Mikolka, are you crazy to put a nag like that in such a cart?"

"And this mare is twenty if she is a day, mates!"

"Get in, I'll take you all," Mikolka shouted again, leaping first into the cart, seizing the reins and standing straight up in front. "The bay has gone with Matvey," he shouted from the cart--"and this brute, mates, is just breaking my heart, I feel as if I could kill her. She's just eating her head off. Get in, I tell you! I'll make her gallop! She'll gallop!" and he picked up the whip, preparing himself with relish to flog the little mare.

"Get in! Come along!" The crowd laughed. "D'you hear, she'll gallop!"

"Gallop indeed! She has not had a gallop in her for the last ten years!"

"She'll jog along!"

"Don't you mind her, mates, bring a whip each of you, get ready!"

"All right! Give it to her!"

They all clambered into Mikolka's cart, laughing and making jokes. Six men got in and there was still room for more. They hauled in a fat, rosy-cheeked woman. She was dressed in red cotton, in a pointed, beaded headdress and thick leather shoes; she was cracking nuts and laughing. The crowd round them was laughing too and indeed, how could they help laughing? That wretched nag was to drag all the cartload of them at a gallop! Two young fellows in the cart were just getting whips ready to help Mikolka. With the cry of "now," the mare tugged with all her might, but far from galloping, could scarcely move forward; she struggled with her legs, gasping and shrinking from the blows of the three whips which were showered upon her like hail. The laughter in the cart and in the crowd was redoubled, but Mikolka flew into a rage and furiously thrashed the mare, as though he supposed she really could gallop.

"Let me get in, too, mates," shouted a young man in the crowd whose appetite was aroused.

"Get in, all get in," cried Mikolka, "she will draw you all. I'll beat her to death!" And he thrashed and thrashed at the mare, beside himself with fury.

"Father, father," he cried, "father, what are they doing? Father, they are beating the poor horse!"

"Come along, come along!" said his father. "They are drunken and foolish, they are in fun; come away, don't look!" and he tried to draw him away, but he tore himself away from his hand, and, beside himself with horror, ran to the horse. The poor beast was in a bad way. She was gasping, standing still, then tugging again and almost falling.

"Beat her to death," cried Mikolka, "it's come to that. I'll do for her!"

"What are you about, are you a Christian, you devil?" shouted an old man in the crowd.

"Did anyone ever see the like? A wretched nag like that pulling such a cartload," said another.

"You'll kill her," shouted the third.

"Don't meddle! It's my property, I'll do what I choose. Get in, more of you! Get in, all of you! I will have her go at a gallop! . . ."

All at once laughter broke into a roar and covered everything: the mare, roused by the shower of blows, began feebly kicking. Even the old man could not help smiling. To think of a wretched little beast like that trying to kick!

Two lads in the crowd snatched up whips and ran to the mare to beat her about the ribs. One ran each side.

"Hit her in the face, in the eyes, in the eyes," cried Mikolka.

"Give us a song, mates," shouted someone in the cart and everyone in the cart joined in a riotous song, jingling a tambourine and whistling. The woman went on cracking nuts and laughing.. . He ran beside the mare, ran in front of her, saw her being whipped across the eyes, right in the eyes! He was crying, he felt choking, his tears were streaming. One of the men gave him a cut with the whip across the face, he did not feel it. Wringing his hands and screaming, he rushed up to the grey-headed old man with the grey beard, who was shaking his head in disapproval. One woman seized him by the hand and would have taken him away, but he tore himself from her and ran back to the mare. She was almost at the last gasp, but began kicking once more.

"I'll teach you to kick," Mikolka shouted ferociously. He threw down the whip, bent forward and picked up from the bottom of the cart a long, thick shaft, he took hold of one end with both hands and with an effort brandished it over the mare.

"He'll crush her," was shouted round him. "He'll kill her!"

"It's my property," shouted Mikolka and brought the shaft down with a swinging blow. There was a sound of a heavy thud.

"Thrash her, thrash her! Why have you stopped?" shouted voices in the crowd.

And Mikolka swung the shaft a second time and it fell a second time on the spine of the luckless mare. She sank back on her haunches, but lurched forward and tugged forward with all her force, tugged first on one side and then on the other, trying to move the cart. But the six whips were attacking her in all directions, and the shaft was raised again and fell upon her a third time, then a fourth, with heavy measured blows. Mikolka was in a fury that he could not kill her at one blow.

"She's a tough one," was shouted in the crowd.

"She'll fall in a minute, mates, there will soon be an end of her," said an admiring spectator in the crowd.

"Fetch an axe to her! Finish her off," shouted a third.

"I'll show you! Stand off," Mikolka screamed frantically; he threw down the shaft, stooped down in the cart and picked up an iron crowbar. "Look out," he shouted, and with all his might he dealt a stunning blow at the poor mare. The blow fell; the mare staggered, sank back, tried to pull, but the bar fell again with a swinging blow on her back and she fell on the ground like a log.

"Finish her off," shouted Mikolka and he leapt beside himself, out of the cart. Several young men, also flushed with drink, seized anything they could come across--whips, sticks, poles, and ran to the dying mare. Mikolka stood on one side and began dealing random blows with the crowbar. The mare stretched out her head, drew a long breath and died.

"You butchered her," someone shouted in the crowd.

"Why wouldn't she gallop then?"

"My property!" shouted Mikolka, with bloodshot eyes, brandishing the bar in his hands. He stood as though regretting that he had nothing more to beat.

"No mistake about it, you are not a Christian," many voices were shouting in the crowd.

But the poor boy, beside himself, made his way, screaming, through the crowd to the sorrel nag, put his arms round her bleeding dead head and kissed it, kissed the eyes and kissed the lips. . . . Then he jumped up and flew in a frenzy with his little fists out at Mikolka. At that instant his father, who had been running after him, snatched him up and carried him out of the crowd.

"Come along, come! Let us go home," he said to him.

"Father! Why did they . . . kill . . . the poor horse!" he sobbed, but his voice broke and the words came in shrieks from his panting chest.

"They are drunk. . . . They are brutal . . . it's not our business!" said his father. He put his arms round his father but he felt choked, choked. He tried to draw a breath, to cry out--and woke up.

He waked up, gasping for breath, his hair soaked with perspiration, and stood up in terror.

"Thank God, that was only a dream," he said, sitting down under a tree and drawing deep breaths. "But what is it? Is it some fever coming on? Such a hideous dream!"

[armenian]

nice going, :thumbs_up

[coolestnerdever]

"I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet." ~Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar, Chapter 7

[Corbin Maxwell]

There's so much to choose from.

One of my favorite scenes is when Natasha comes to Prince Andrei's wagon in the middle of the night while he lies wounded from a shell fragment received at the battle of Borodino.

And I don't know if it's beautiful or not, but my favorite opening sentence of any book:

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

Everything's right there in that one sentence.

[muchado22]

:you shall above all things be glad and young: e.e. cummings
you shall above all things be glad and young
For if you're young,whatever life you wear


it will become you;and if you are glad
whatever's living will yourself become.
Girlboys may nothing more than boygirls need:
i can entirely her only love


whose any mystery makes every man's
flesh put space on;and his mind take off time


that you should ever think,may god forbid
and (in his mercy) your true lover spare:
for that way knowledge lies,the foetal grave
called progress,and negation's dead undoom.


I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance

[Proust71]

In Victor Hugo's work The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, the author digresses, although importantly, to the works and construction of architecture. Never before have I beheld something that captivated me and informed me simultaneously. Beautifully done. Oh, and I cannot languish the ending to Plato's The Republic, as it structures the reincarnation of the soul, which, albeit I do not believe in such recurrences of human essence, aesthetically penetrated my mind wherein I shall never forget.

[kelby_lake]

“--and I looked and looked at her, and knew as clearly as I know I am to die, that I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else. She was only the faint violet whiff and dead leaf echo of the nymphet I had rolled myself upon with such cries in the past; an echo on the brink of a russet ravine, with a far wood under a white sky, and brown leaves choking the brook, and one last cricket in the crisp weeds . . . but thank God it was not that echo alone that I worshipped. What I used to pamper among the tangled vines of my heart, mon grand pèchè radieux, had dwindled to its essence: sterile and selfish vice, all that I canceled and cursed. You may jeer at me, and threaten to clear the court, but until I am gagged and half-throttled, I will shout my poor truth. I insist the world know how much I loved my Lolita, this Lolita, pale and polluted, and big with another's child, but still gray-eyed, still sooty-lashed, still auburn and almond, still Carmencita, still mine; Changeons de vie, ma Carmen, allons vivre quelque part oû nous ne serons jamais sèparès; Ohio? The wilds of Massachusetts? No matter, even if those eyes of hers would fade to myopic fish, and her nipples swell and crack, and her lovely young velvety delicate delta be tainted and torn--even then I would go mad with tenderness at the mere sight of your dear wan face, at the mere sound of your raucous young voice, my Lolita.”

[Victoria2133]

To say that I can cite a "most beautiful" piece of literature would be very difficult. I can say that a "very beautiful" piece of literature would be Eavan Boland's poem, "Listen. This is the Noise of Myth." Definitely read it if you haven't yet. Also, most of John Banville's work is beautifully written.

[Idril]

Halldor Laxness regularly creates scenes that I proclaim to be the most beautiful thing ever written, the book Independent People is rich with such moments and I can easily say the book as a whole is the most beautiful book I've ever read despite it's bleak content. Here is a sampling:

"A grassy hollow on the margin of the river, and leading up to it through the dew the wandering trail left by two inexperienced feet. The birds were silent for a while. She sat on the bank and listened. Then she stripped herself of her torn everyday rags under a sky that could wipe even the sunless winters of a whole lifetime from the memory, the sky of this Midsummer Eve. Young goddess of the sunlit night, perfect in her half-mature nakedness. Nothing in life is so beautiful as the night before what is yet to be, the night and its dew. She wished her wish, slender and half-grown in the half-grown grass and its dew. Body and soul were one, and the unity was perfectly pure in the wish."

"When life is a weariness and escape impossible, it is wonderful to have a friend who can bring us peace with the touch of a hand."

Those were good days. They were serene days and quite undemonstrative, like the best days in one's life; the boy never forgot them. Nothing happens; one simply lives and breathes and wishes for nothing more, and nothing more."

And then there's this from his World Light:

"And the night went on passing. All life's thread were entwined into one cord, all it's laws reduced to their fundamentals, love reigned alone. The first rays of the morning sun found a man and woman, naked, smiling mankind's eternal smile at one another, and the murmur of the birds had grown louder and the sea was ruffled by the morning breeze, and they had started whispering to one another and telling one another the story of their love."

I have to stop now or I'll end up repeating the whole of his books. I'm not sure they retain their full power when read out of context but they hold a lot of power for me.

[Quark]

One of my favorite passages (I prefer the Garnett translation--of this passage especially--but another is provided for those who particularly dislike Garnett's translations):


THE IDIOT by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Excerpted from Part II, Chapter V

I liked that part, too. The novel was a little inconsistent in quality, but certain sections were very engaging. That part describing Myskin's seisure was one of the better parts that kept you reading through some of the long boring sections.

If I had to pick a beautiful piece of text, I'd probably go with the end of Kafka's The Trial. It may seem like an odd choice since it's rather morbid and not particularly pretty, but there is an image which is quite moving at the very end. K., who's been dodging conviction for an undefined crime, is finally caught and about to be killed when he sees someone in the distance appear from out a window in a far off building.


As he looked round, he saw the top floor of the building next
to the quarry. He saw how a light flickered on and the two halves of a
window opened out, somebody, made weak and thin by the height and the
distance, leant suddenly far out from it and stretched his arms out even
further. Who was that? A friend? A good person? Somebody who was
taking part? Somebody who wanted to help? Was he alone? Was it
everyone? Would anyone help? Were there objections that had been
forgotten? There must have been some. The logic cannot be refuted, but
someone who wants to live will not resist it. Where was the judge he'd
never seen? Where was the high court he had never reached? He raised
both hands and spread out all his fingers.

I suppose it's not as beautiful if you haven't read the rest of the story, so I'll try to explain it quickly. K. has been on a search for the high court in order to face the accusations against him, but instead he's lead through a maze of beauracracy. He never meets the judge in charge of his case. He only get to communicate with certain petty officials who don't even seem particularly interested in whether K. is innocent or not. K's search becomes more abstract as the story goes on. It becomes less about him, and more about finding justice. The petty officials try to get K. to abandon his ideals of truth and justice, and instead work within the corrupt system. K. defies them to the end, so they have to execute him. When the person emerges from the window in the quote above, it's a symbol for those ideals that K. searched for. Kafka handles it well, too. He makes the person ambiguous. We never know who they were or why they opened the window, just as we're never sure whether K's idea of truth and justice is real either. The image is both an effective symbol and a beautiful image.

[WayneHughes]

From Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad:

Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity became less brilliant but more profound. The old river in its broad reach rested unruffled at the decline of day, after ages of good service done to the race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil dignity of a waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth. We looked at the venerable stream not in the vivid flush of a short day that comes and departs for ever, but in the august light of abiding memories. And indeed nothing is easier for a man who has, as the phrase goes, "followed the sea" with reverence and affection, that to evoke the great spirit of the past upon the lower reaches of the Thames. The tidal current runs to and fro in its unceasing service, crowded with memories of men and ships it had borne to the rest of home or to the battles of the sea. It had known and served all the men of whom the nation is proud, from Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights all, titled and untitled--the great knights-errant of the sea. It had borne all the ships whose names are like jewels flashing in the night of time, from the Golden Hind returning with her rotund flanks full of treasure, to be visited by the Queen's Highness and thus pass out of the gigantic tale, to the Erebus and Terror, bound on other conquests-- and that never returned. It had known the ships and the men. They had sailed from Deptford, from Greenwich, from Erith-- the adventurers and the settlers; kings' ships and the ships of men on 'Change; captains, admirals, the dark "interlopers" of the Eastern trade, and the commissioned "generals" of East India fleets. Hunters for gold or pursuers of fame, they all had gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a spark from the sacred fire. What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unknown earth! . . . The dreams of men, the seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.

[mortalterror]

The first two pages of Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel has to be the most beautiful opening I can recall to a novel, as impressive in fact as the opening of Nabokov's Lolita. I'm not sure if it's still under copyright, so I'll post a link to it's Amazon site.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0743297318/ref=sib_dp_pop_ex?ie=UTF8&p=S00J#reader-link

[kelby_lake]

It's strange!

[Quark]

Halldor Laxness regularly creates scenes that I proclaim to be the most beautiful thing ever written, the book Independent People is rich with such moments and I can easily say the book as a whole is the most beautiful book I've ever read despite it's bleak content. Here is a sampling:

Those are some excellent quotes. I hadn't even thought of Halldor Laxness until you brought him up, but Independent People is filled with beautiful moments. Halldor Laxness has a way of romanticizing everything, but in Independent People that instinct is supercharged by the young artist character, Nonni. His perspective is one of imaginative pantheism; and, when the story is told from his perspective, Laxness really indulges in flights of imagination. The part where he's imagining the life of the kitchen implements is a very characteristic scene.


From Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad:

And that's like page two of Heart of Darkness, right? Already Conrad has driven to the center of the story without so much as having to introduce the plot or characters. What an excellent way to start the novella.


The first two pages of Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel has to be the most beautiful opening I can recall to a novel

Yes, you strike me as a Thomas Wolfe fan. I actually didn't remember that opening, though, until you pointed it out. It is quite good. Another good part might be from the other book with those characters--I think it's something like Of Time and the River or Of the River and Time. There's a part where the main character has a dream representing his father's death. It's not beautiful in a picturesque way, but I thought it was beautiful it's own way. Unfortunately, I don't own the book so I can't quote it.

[WICKES]

From Evelyn Waugh's 'Brideshead Revisited':

"Oxford, in those days, was still a city of aquatint. In her spacious and quiet streets men walked and spoke as they had done in Newman's day; her autumnal mists, her grey springtime, and the rare of her summer days- such as that day- when the chestnut was in flower and the bells rang out high and clear over her gables and cupolas, exhaled the soft vapours of a thousand years of learning. It was this cloistral hush which gave our laughter its resonance, and carried it still, joyously, over the intervening clamour..."