Write down the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside your hand

[CarpeNixta]

solo los libros pueden hacernos soportable y hasta dichosa una larga noche de invierno
(Only books can make bearable and even happy a long winter night)

J.W, Goethe Faust

[BlackCat]

" He told us about the magic qualities every number has and how number unlock the secrets of the universe"
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls

[kiki1982]

'Mr Harding looked blank and annoyed; there was something in the tone of the young man's voice which told him that the interview was intended to be disagreeable, and he shrank back at finding his kindly greeting so repulsed.'

Anthony Trollope, The Warden, 1855

It is proving quite a delight :), I think I may start on Austen's last now... I have found a substitute :banana:

[cacian]

Well I have two.

One in Spanish and One in American English.

''res os pido un poco de flexibilidad e imaginacion, virtu-''
Lucia Etxebarria, Ya No Sufro Por Amor

''strong as a bull''
John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men

[goodbadluck]

"Now her mother was upstairs with the man who had gotten rid of the only other company she had."

Beloved by Toni Morrison

[Pensive]

He was happy to hear that Ruya was no longer wandering through the garden of her memories and was back in the real world with everyone else. - The Black Book by Orhan Pamuk

[iamnobody]

"This, also," Luka added, and tore the note to bits under the vulture's cynical beak, "is the letter of a nasty man, trying to make out that he could make my father ill."-Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie

[bouquin]

So said Athene, the daughter of Zeus.

[jake21221]

"How many times did you shoot?"

The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway

[Dark Muse]

"It reminded her of the Russian ballet that Madame Medinsky had taken her to at the Victoria Theater last year."

The Russian Concubine by Kate Furnivall

[sickboy]

calling on mrs fujiwara aroused in me much the same mixture of feelings; for she had been amongst my mother's closest friends, a kindly woman with hair that was by then turning grey.


a pale view of hills, kazuo ishiguro.

[irishpixieb]

"She had taken up a w wrong idea, fancying it was a mother and daughter, a son and a son's wife who all lived together, but when it appeared that Mr. Martin who bore a part in the narrative and was always mentioned with approbation for his great good nature in doing something or other was a single man-that there was no young Mrs. Martin, no wife in that case- she did suspect danger to her poor little friend from all this hospitality and kindness, and that if she were not taken care of, she might be required to sink herself forever."

"Emma" by Jane Austen

[Darcy88]

The sun was just down and to the west lay reefs of bloodred clouds up out of which rose little desert nighthawks like fugitives from some great fire at the earth's end.

From Blood Meridian.

[Calidore]

The house's windows flashed brightly, emitting solid beams of blue-white light which appeared quite dazzling under the scarlet sky.

-- The Neutronium Alchemist by Peter F. Hamilton

[Patrick_Bateman]

Thus was a Quaker rais'd to sovereign power.

-Voltaire, Letters Concerning the English Nation

[JuniperWoolf]

Such thoughts pass through the consciousness so swiftly that they are gone before they can be more than glimpsed, but sometimes like comets trapped at last by a giant sun, they cannot escape and from their stubborn material the mind forges a masterpiece of literatrue, of philosophy or music.

-The Collective Short Stories of Arthur C Clarke

[ComicBookGirl]

" Like a nun withdrawing , or a child explorng a tower, she went, upstairs, paused at the window, came to the bathroom"
-Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

[Scout]

When we entered the classroom, Angela went to sit at a black- topped lab table exactly like the ones I was used to.

This is from the book Twilight by Stephenie Meyer.

[Chris1991]

"Does she always devour her victims"
The Witcher EE short book - Andrzej Sapkowski

[kiki1982]

"Elizabeth said, 'I'm free now, if he would like to come up.'"

(PD James, Deat Comes to Pemberley, 2011)

[kiki1982]

I think I will have to revive this wonderful topic once again! :D

"Fanny was too much surprised to do more than repeat her aunt's words, 'Going to leave you?'"

Mansfield Park, 1814

[aliengirl]

"What do you suppose I have to wear to such a thing as that?"

The Diamond Necklace by Maupassant

[bouquin]

But that's what you risk when you leave here.

[bouquin]

Christ she would crack up!

[bouquin]

And suddenly, standing there among the fruit barrows and corn-bins, in the middle of the street, it had seemed the most important thing she could do, to use some of the money left from Godmother Fry's gift, spend it extravagantly, like the woman who had poured out the jar of precious ointments.

[Patito de Hule]

"His whole power was in his numbers."

The Prostrate State: South Carolina under Negro Government by James S. Pike

[bouquin]

Philip, not averse to such assistance, got his own face into shadow.

[Patrick_Bateman]

"In the company of the poet and the scholar he felt himself in a new position, almost, indeed in possession of a new legitimacy."

The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy

[aliengirl]

"When we landed we watched the discharging of the graceful three-master which we have observed from the other quay."
- An Encounter by Joyce

[ave d]

Wax doll!

- The Golem (Meyrink)

[bouquin]

True, there were winters when three or four of her two dozen little boarders died.

[bouquin]

On the morning of the 23rd I took the train from Zurich to Lausanne.

[Babyguile]

The daring amphibious landing at Incheon of forty thousand US troops under the command of General Douglas MacArthur in September reversed the Communist gains.

[RicMisc]

"Did you not think, Mr. Darcy, that I expressed myself uncommonly well just now, when I was teasing Colonel Forster to give us a ball at Meryton?"

- Pride and Prejudice

[bouquin]

That was true too; but kings who personify an idea should not, cannot, fall below a certain level for generations; if they do, my dear brother-in-law, the idea suffers too.

[Babyguile]

Female slaves, the wives of metics and foreigners, concubines, and courtesans were all excluded from the festival.

[kiki1982]

I almost forgot about this topic! :eek: My book took so long this time...

Anyway...

'He was a swimmer, and during the competitive season, he shaved every hair off his his body so he was smooth as plastic.'

(The Jane Austen Book Club, 2004)

Prooving a very funny read now I have read all of Austen.

[Markyparky56]

"Figure 1.14 Complex search terms in a search engine." - How to pass Standard Grade Computing

Technicaly this was the second book because the first didn't have a fourth sentence.

[TylerDurden]

In the slanting beams that streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden.

Oscar Wilde - The Picture of Dorian Gray

[Babyguile]

I lay in my basket, and my mother lay in her bed; but Betsey Trotwood Copperfield was forever in the land of dreams and shadows, the tremendous region whence I had so lately travelled; and the light upon the window of our room shone out upon the earthly bourne of all such travellers, and the mound above the ashes and the dust that once was he, without whom I had never been.

[kiki1982]

Wow, I have to grudgingly admit that that sentence from Dickens struck me as singularly masterful. I might just check and see whether that novel could pull me onto the Dickens fence and maybe off the other side...

[Babyguile]

That line happened to be the last line of the first chapter! I'm halfway through the novel and I know Dickens has given me characters I will find hard to forget.

[hawthorns]

What if one sentence takes up the whole page?

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"The necessary arrangements were made, and Lewinski and his wife were taken by Major Gidson and two other men to Paris, travelling on British diplomatic lassez-passez through Gdynia and Stockholm to avoid Germany." - Anthony Cave Brown Bodyguard of Lies Volume I

[tailor STATELY]

Compose an Evening Sky-

[PoeticPassions]

"'Lie down, lie down,' said Krug, 'it is getting very late. I must go now. Come, lie down. Quick.'" Bend Sinister, Vladimir Nabokov (I know this is more than one sentence, but it made more sense to write the entire line down)

[kiki1982]

Maybe not a book, but a magazine...

"Den Fuss in dieser Einteilung weiterarb[eiten], 21 (22,5) cm Fusslänge erreicht sind."

(Sabrina, Socken)

"Carry on working the foot, until you have reached 21 (22.5) cm in length."

From the German knitting magazine Sabrina, the socks booklet with a comprehensive explanation how to do so. I had tried with two books, but could make head nor tale from it... And then came Sabrina...

[martunia99]

"Feet pushing hard into the sand,intent on keeping my progresssteady and sure, choosing walking over flying since, in my experience anyway, flying in the fog isn't near as much fun as it might seem at first."
("Shimmer" the second book in the Riley Bloom Trology)

[Babyguile]

'The Gaint Wistaria' is alive with suggestive implications about unjust patriarchal dogmatism, rebellious and fatally suppressed female sexuality, and the return into the present of what has been culturally repressed in the past.

[RicMisc]

'Then he said I hadn't any guts.' - The Stranger by Camus

[suprematist]

Christianity was, from the beginning, essentially and fundamentally, life's nausea and disgust with life, merely concealed behind, masked by, dressed up as, faith in "another" or "better" life.

-- The Basic Writings of Nietzsche

[victoriana]

I could hardly bear for them to look upon herat all; worse still, I thought I couldn't endure to have them look upon me, as I watched her.

Tipping the Velvet, Sarah Waters

Lots of looking...

[Easter]

"The joylessness of the color scheme was matched only by the joylessness of their faces." ~ Fear of Flying, Erica Jong

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"He'll show you the way, sir, and I'se warrant ye'll be weel put up; for they never turn awa naebody frae the door; and ye'll be come in the canny moment, I'm thinking, for the Laird's servant- that's not to say his body servant, but the helper like-rade express by this e'en to fetch the houdie and he just staid the drinking o'twa pints o' tippenny, to tell us how my leddy was ta'en wi' her pains."
Walter Scott Guy Mannering

[martunia99]

"There were no more internal doors, but one led out to what looked like a lean-to greenhouse, filled with herbs and green."

- "The Amulet of Samarkand", Jonathan Stroud

[msmoonlite]

"She thought the time had come to get to know Fay a little better"

- Eudora Welty, "The Optimists Daughter"

[bouquin]

Many rumors like this about Enishte Effendi had begun to fly due to the secrecy of the book he was making and the money he was willing to pay - and because Master Osman, the Head Illuminator, despised him.

[neilgee]

Banks later discovered that this dramatic way of expressing grief was universal amongst the Tahitian women, and he saw many who had permanent 'grief scars' on their heads.

The Age of Wonder by Richard Holmes

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"Not far from me squatted one of the tankmen, a native of Rostov, a tall, melancholy senior lieutenant." Alexander Solzhenitsyn The Gulag Archipelago

.

[halfmoon25]

"They quarreled over it each time, not because she didn't want you baptized, but because she didn't want you baptized catholic." -Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card

[bouquin]

If the outside world has got on so long without me, it may go on for some time longer.

[kiki1982]

"Her voice was gentle and childish, her tread light and soft as that of a cat; but her manners more frequently resembled those of a pretty playful kitten, that is now pert and rogish, now timid and demure; according to its own sweet will."

(Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, 1848)

[IntravenousJava]

"So that if my grandfather wished to attract the attention of the two sisters, he had to resort to some such physical stimuli as alienists adopt in dealing with their distracted patients: to wit, repeated taps on a glass with the blade of a knife, accompanied by a sharp word and a compelling glance, violent methods which these psychiatrists are apt to bring with them into their everyday life among the sane, either from force of professional habit or because they think the whole world a trifle mad."

(Remembrance of Things Past, Marcel Proust)

[suprematist]

We must grasp this Idea more concretely, more profoundly, since the emptiness, which clings to the Platonic Idea, no longer satisfies the richer philosophical needs of our spirit today.

--G.W.F. Hegel, Lectures on Fine Art I

[Polednice]

"And by this means very many be forced to forsake work and to give themselves to idleness."

- Utopia by Thomas More (1516). I'm guessing he's not at the utopian part yet. :p

[bouquin]

He had broken the sabbath to do it.

[Germ]

"If there were gaps in the writer's sources, they were filled with fantasy, even by echoes of names which were already contained in the lists themselves."

Thompson, The Mythic Past.

[Rebecca1122]

"I rested my hand against a pillow or an arm, and felt easy."

-"Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte

[Snowqueen]

He had been a boy along with Morel, so that,while the two disliked each other, they more or less took each other for granted.

Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence

[Gyges]

The principality of the sky lightens now, over our green hill, into spring morning larked and crowed and belling.

- Under Milk Wood, Dylan Thomas

[Buckthorn]

Frannie leaned one hand against the warm metal of her car, took off her sneakers, and put on a pair of rubber thongs.

The stand, Stephen King

[The Dilettante]

Vomiting in null gravity wouldn't be fun.

Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card.

[Musaeus]

I am an old-fashioned man who has stuck by certain romantic notions dear to me, one of which is the highly subjectivizing contrast I feel between the nature of the artist and the nature of the ordinary man.

Thomas Mann - 'Doctor Faustus'

[bouquin]

She turned from the window and dropped her nightgown over her head.

[Babyguile]

Here, participants watch and hear people act out unscripted interactions.

[The Kid]

"A small flame would be extinguished, but a bright fire rapidly claims as its own all that is heaped on it, devours it all, and leaps up yet higher in consequence."

-Meditations, by Marcus Aurelius

Not as good as some of the others here.

[Dina12]

The little girl had been offered the oppertunity of laying down a foundation ofknowledge in this establishment; but having spent a sigle day in it, she had protested against its laws and had been allowed to stay at home, where, in the September days, when the windows of the Dutch house were open, she used to hear the hum of childish voices repeating the multiplication table-an indicdent in which the elation of liberty and the pain of exclusion were indistinguishably mingled.

Portait of a Lady - Henry James

[Drnobody901]

'People,' Gerald turned his head, 'like to invent monsters and monstrosities.'

The Lash Wish- Andrzej Sapokowski

[Pensive]

'People,' Gerald turned his head, 'like to invent monsters and monstrosities.'

The Lash Wish- Andrzej Sapokowski

Good one.

[Mr. Mauve]

"And - once this curtain had risen - when on the stage a writing table and a fireplace, in no way out of the ordinary, had indicated that the persons who were about to enter would be, not actors come to recite as I had once seen some of them do at an evening party, but real people, just living their lives at home, on whom I was thus able to spy without their seeing me, my pleasure still endured."

From volume 2 of Proust's In Search of Lost Time, Within a Budding Grove. Characteristically long.

[kiki1982]

Bl**dy hell, what a great sentence was that! I'll have to pluck up the courage for Proust once!

"Economically - with a dash of love."

The Moonstone, Wilkie Collins, 1868

[Oof]

"The only true presumption is the rebuttable presumption of law in terms of which an assumption which is demanded by law, must be accepted in the absence of evidence or proof to the contrary." Principles of Evidence 2nd Ed by Schwikkard & Van der Merwe

[bouquin]

"I can't take much more of it, Chango, open it up."

[neilgee]

8 - When Johnny comes marching home ADAM FAITH Parlophone

Chart listings. Top 40 charts (UK) introduced by David Mcaleer

[djameson]

I wanted her to be a slave so that I could set her free and make her rich.

[hvor_poetisk]

And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

[neilgee]

In the words of Alan Kay, whose 1968 vision of the portable computer, an environment where children could learn by 'making', seemed, at the time, wholly unrealizable: "You can go on working on an impossible project for a long time if it has a lot of romance in it."

Cultural Babbage essays edited by Jenny Uglow

[bouquin]

'Ain't nobody been knifed there in a month.'

[Buckthorn]

And someone was goggling through the bars at him: a freckle-faced, red-haired, long-nosed someone.

[bouquin]

Back in the City Room, Duncan, my editor, asks, "Single or double sink?"

[BitofEndearment]

Stopping before a window display she said with great gusto: "je vais m'acheter des bas!" and never may I forget the way her Parisian childish lips exploded on "bas," pronouncing it with an appetite that all but changed the "a" into a brief buoyant bursting "o" as in "bot."

Lolita

[Buckthorn]

"Sounds were deadened, shapes blurred." - The woman in black

[bouquin]

On a late afternoon Nanny had called her to come inside the house because she had spied Janie letting Johnny Taylor kiss her over the gatepost.

[Buckthorn]

He couldn't offer one a lift without offering all; he wanted the company of none. The Submission - Amy Waldman

[Reverie323]

"Everything he said was true and sincere; Finny always said what he happened to be thinking, and if this stunned people then he was surprised." A Separate Peace by John Knowles

[tica57]

Page 23, sentence 4:

Far back down time that was, straight though it be.

Knights Gambit by William Faulkner

[Kafka's Crow]

"I don't think so," said Rabbit. "It isn't meant to be."
AA Milne: The Complete Tales and Poems of Winnie-the- Pooh, pg 23

[neilgee]

And feather'd clouds strew flowers round her head.

The Norton Anthology of English Literature (6th edition, volume 2)

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"Figure 7. - First flight engine, 1903: cylinder, valve box, and gear mechanism; below, miscellanoeus parts. (Photos courtesy Science Museum, London, and Louis P. Christman)"

The quoted caption above is from a 1971 Smithsonian Annals of Flight publication on the Wright Brothers' engines and their design desribing two photos on the 23rd page.

[bouquin]

I had spent the night with Sandra.

[Snowqueen]

I think we might have something to eat first, don't you? Said her grandfather.

From Heidi by Johanna Spyri

[thelastmelon]

Your hand again.
- Chamber Music by James Joyce

[bouquin]

Then she placed her hands, vertically, over her eyes and pressed the heels hard, as though to paralyze the optic nerve and drown all images into a voidlike black.

[Emil Miller]

The two officers exchanged glances, and the next question brought a bemused look to the face of the bereaved man when he was asked to account for his own movements that day.

[Buckthorn]

"There will be no food provided or permitted in the library" - The library book by Alan Bennett et al.

[bouquin]

It was not the first time, nor the second, that I had gone away - as it seemed, permanently - but yet returned, like the bad half-penny; or as if Salem were for me the inevitable centre of the universe.

[bouquin]

They run together toward the open doorway, awkwardly, bumping up against each other, the old Jew's fingers never once letting go of the woman's wrist.

[maxphisher]

"You must have a good record, a clean sheet." - Flann O'Brien, At Swim-Two-Birds

[Anymodal]

"Pero tampoco quise abrir ese día porque no estimo absolutamente a quienes se corrigen demasiado pronto"

"But I didn't want to answer the door that day either because I don't like those who change their minds too quickly"

Giovanni Papini, Historia completamente absurda

[bouquin]

There is no boy, there are no footsteps when he leaves.

[bouquin]

It is another, a worse kind of sickness.

[Grimble]

The Knight had not travelled far, when he fancied he heard an effeminate voice complaining in a thicket on his right hand.

[oleanderwood]

At nineteen her fine grey eyes looked challenge, and her warm complexion, her black hair looped up slack, enforced the sensuous folding of her mouth.

[bouquin]

Her legs were too bad. -- from Selected Stories by Nadine Gordimer

[moriniq]

He worked with fanatical intensity for twelve or fourteen hours a day, sinking into bed in the evening worn down by the crushing weight of numbers, to sleep dreamlessly.
Journey Into The Past (Stephan Zweig).

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"The people were serious minded, and the reader finds scarce humor in their literature."

(My son left his high school British Literature text book on the desk. Talking about the Anglo-Saxon period historical context)

[Tor-Hershman]

"Note that the last term has only two significant figures (the zero is significant)."

Essentials Of Applied Physics by John E. Betts

[SkyCetacean]

"My first interview with the manager was curious."

-Heart Of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

[bouquin]

'What's the matter with you?' he drawled.

[jweyek]

"That was very nice," she said and went back to the kitchen.

From the short story "The Barber": The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor

[SkyCetacean]

"Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given me the inch and no precaution could prevent me from taking the ell."

-Narrative Of The Life Of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass

[jmnixon95]

"The wandering, murderous monster slew him in Heorot; and I do not know where that ghoul, drooling at her feast of flesh and blood, made off afterwards."

English Literature textbook of mine

[dark desire]

Among others of this kind was Dr. Blifil, a gentleman who had the misfortune of losing the advantage of great talents by the obstinacy of a father, who would breed him to a profession he disliked.

- Tom Jones by Henry Fielding

[SkyCetacean]

"'Not one of them would have stopped her, even that little one almost old enough to be selfish and stone-hearted like the rest of them.'"

-As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner

[Snowqueen]

Jenny was now summoned to appear in person before Mrs. Deborah, which she immediately did.

Tom Jones by Henry Fielding

[bouquin]

He was more nervous than he had thought and kept turning his head this way and that as if afraid he was being observed by thousands of eyes hidden in the darkness of the aisles between the shelves.

[krishna_lit]

At last he could go no farther, and the stone tired him terribly; he dragged himself to the side of a pond, that he might drink some water, and rest a while; so he laid the stone carefully by his side on the bank: but as he stopped down to drink, he forgot it, pushed it a little, and down it went plump into the pond.

"Grimms' Fairy Tales" by Brothers Grimm - Tale: Hans In Luck

[bouquin]

Mrs Nugent was his sister.

[manuscript]

"His bald purplish head now looked for all the world like a mildewed skull." from Moby Dick

[kiki1982]

"Les plus sensés faisaient observer que monsieur Cruchot de Bonfons avait ses entrées à toute heure au logis, tandis que son rival n'y était reçu que les dimanches."

"The most sensible ones remarked that Mr Cruchot de Bonfons was welcomed in the house at all hours of the day, while his rival was only received there on Sundays."

Eugénie Grandet, Honoré de Balzac, 1833

[Stosyl]

"He was a remarkably handsome man, dark, aquiline, and moustached—evidently the man of whom I had heard."

"A Scandal In Bohemia" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

[Dark Muse]

I've observed him many times presiding over some official ceremony or in the salon of the Nesle sisters, and his demeanor has always been the same: timid, withdrawn, as though his role as king were too much for him.

Rasero - Francisco Rebolledo

[bouquin]

They could surely be married in six months' time.

[Babyguile]

Birds squabbled over the cidery crush milled under by the cartwheels, and winds whisked their burden of scrapping, flying leaves, sharpened by frost off the peaks.

[Ser Nevarc]

Which book Babyguile?

[bouquin]

I mentioned what they had said about her, and she laughed, and told me they were impudent fellows who talked nonsense - but I knew it pleased her.

[Babyguile]

Which book Babyguile?

Ships of Merior by Janny Wurts. That line really demonstrates her writing style which is turgid at its worst but vividly descriptive at its best.

[Babyguile]

A particularly sharp rise in food prices precipitated the strikes and popular demonstrations of July 1919.

[Babyguile]

As Conan Doyle insisted, Tit-Bits and its many imitators deliberately aimed at the audience created by the 1870 Education Act, readers who were "not sufficiently educated to study the deepest and thickest volumes" (quoted in McDonald 1997: 145).

[Snowqueen]

‘Let’s go and sit in the gazebo,’ she continued, and ‘please, until I myself begin to talk with you, don’t mention…that book to me.’

Faust by Turgenev

[Acid park]

Stopping before a window display she said with great gusto: "je Avis m'acheter des bas!" and never may I forget the way her Parisian childish lips exploded on 'bas', pronouncing it with an appetite that all but the changed 'a' into a brief buoyant bursting 'o' as in 'bot'.

Nabokov displaying his rather annoying tendency to slip into French.

[MeLiKeyClaSsIcS]

She drew back, a tremor passing through her.

The Odd Women by George Gissing

[bouquin]

I endeavoured to lift him up, but the moment I touched him I felt sure that he was dead.

[kiki1982]

"Neither the gentleman nor the lady found it necessary to enlighten her."

Anthony Trollope, Barchester Towers, 1857

[bouquin]

It'll go on till there isn't a cat or a dog left to enlist.

[Babyguile]

I did not like to go quite to the front and stare in at the gate; but I paused beside the garden wall, and looked, and saw no change - except in one wing, where the broken windows and dilapidated roof had evidently been repaired, and where a thin wreath of smoke was curling up from the stack of chimneys.

[Phangirl7]

"Yes, but she craved approval."

[ashulman]

Still more impressive was his tussle with the wallpaper

[kaethe]

Would you like to hear the quote in German?
Das heimliche Ausreißen und der Nachtgang durch den Wald, das war schön, das war ungewohnt, erregend, geheimnisvoll und doch nicht gefährlich.
Narziß und Goldmund von Hermann Hesse S.26

[Teetos]

"If the add-a-beads got tacky, what else will as you go along?"

[Bustrofedon]

"Where are you going when you start writing?"

Sophie's Choice- William Styron

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"10. This article commented on Carnegie's selection for director: 'When he came to select a head for the department of fine arts in his institution Mr. Carnegie might have gone to Europe and chosen a world renowned painter whose standing in the artistic world would have considerable lustre to this branch of the institute's activities."

-Notes from the Introduction to American Drawings and Watercolors Carnegie Institute publication.
I pulled the book to aid in my art thread response.

[bouquin]

- Le service militaire, m'expliqua-t-il, ne convenait pas à ma délicate constitution.

[bouquin]

Accordingly, they were traveling through the world in quest of this beauty; and, after successively rejecting the Queen of Golconda, the Princess of Trebizond, the daughter of the great Khan of Tartary, and many others, Labor and Clergy, Nobility and Trade had come to rest themselves on the marble table of the Palace of Justice, at the same time bestowing on the honest audience as many maxims and aphorisms as could in those days have been picked up at the Faculty of Arts, in the examinations; there were sophisms, arguments, figures of speech, and other wordplay by which masters acquired their caps and their degrees.

[maxphisher]

"Then why didn't she go alive?" I said.

[Snowqueen]

''There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.''

Hamlet by William Shakespeare

[Babyguile]

He came, it would seem, from a highly cultivated home with a great knowledge of literatue, which meant at that time Homer, Hesiod, Pindar, and the lyric poets, in general the great Ionian tradition, together with the first fifty years or so of Attic tragedy.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"Turn to the photographs in the group labeled 'Tree Clinging Birds"

From Audubon Society-Field Guide to North American Birds (Eastern Region)

[T.C. Seiko]

Which I did a few times, followed, of course, by a Malcom Lowry-like hangover.

[Snowqueen]

''It is a story, therefore, that can be read, understood and interpreted at two levels (and in some cases at three or four levels).''

The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory by J. A. Cuddon

[Babyguile]

Enlightenment rationalism displaced religion as the authoritative mode of explaining the universe and altered conceptions of the relations between individuals and natural, supernatural, and social worlds.

*yawn*

[bouquin]

Our ever-insufficient knowledge of the future opposes it: and this is called, in the one instance, hope, and in the other, uncertainty of the following day.

[kiki1982]

"'Who's that singing in the drawing room?'"

Vanity Fair, William Makepiece Thackeray, 1847

[Vota]

The objects of oriental traffic were splendid and trifling; silk, a pound of which was esteemed not inferior in value to a pound of gold; precious stones, among which the pearl claimed the first rank after the diamond; and a variety of aromatics, that were consumed in religious worship and the pomp of funerals.

Gibbon, Edward. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"The expedition, headed by Lt. Colonel John M. Washington, commander of the Ninth Military Department, Santa Fe, had its primary mission "to make a movement against the Navajo Indians," who had lately been troublesome to new settlements along the Rio Grande."

From People of Chaco-A Canyon and Its Culture by Kendrick Frazier
(not reading it - son left it on desk)

[mikejohnk]

Very Nice Discussion. this is knowledgeable Discussion.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

"I guess Marullo's got them shaved as close as they'll shave."
From Steinbeck's The Winter of Our Discontent

(not reading - pulled the book for another thread response)

[LadyStardust]

He understood that she was in need of a dwelling; and though the house he now offered her was merely a cottage, he assured her that every thing should be done to it what she might think necessary, if the situation pleased her.

From Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen.

[Snowqueen]

‘And I, poor fellow’, said the cattle drover; ‘I’m so old and can’t get there yet.’

The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen.

[bouquin]

I can now hear words that we never spoke.

[Snowqueen]

"Don’t you love watching the different ways people have of entering a restaurant?"

Taken from The Complete Saki.

[Scardanelli]

But he would not be a world-historical figure; his influence would be nothing like what it has been -it would be as if Shakespeare had died at thirty-seven, in 1601.

Taken from Basic writings of Nietzsche (Introduction by Peter Gay).

[Babyguile]

Only in the South and in New England would the portfolio genre be preserved in its full purity, because only in these tight enclaves would the fashions popular in Victoria's reign escape the rapid metamorphoses of Victorian culture.

[hannah_arendt]

"This evaluation, though quite correct in the description of a surface phenomenon, overlooks the most serious paradox embodied in the curious political history of the Jews".

H. Arendt, "The origins of Totalitarism"

[PeaceLoveAndTea]

-And twopence, he said, for a pint.
"Ulysses" by James Joyce

[bouquin]

Maybe I should have stayed with her.

[hypatia_]

"I realize, too, that the less I preach, the more likely I am to be heard."

[Snowqueen]

Years went over, and the Giant grew very old and feeble.

The Complete Short Stories of Oscar Wild

[symphony]

"This process would start with Regius."

Descartes' Bones by Russell Shorto

[bouquin]

Hold on, listen to this.

[Melanie]

His face was tight as a clenched fist, and he reeked of liquor,underarm sweat, and three-day-old foul mood.

[NordicFrost]

''Do you know anything about Pyrrhus?''- Ulysses

[coeus]

"Bow, but look straight through them as if they did not exist." - The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick

[bouquin]

Bref, l'argent était à lui...

[Chilly]

To have him notice, speak to me as if I really mattered in his life, after twelve years with him, that's all I want or need.---As for me and my house by Sinclair Ross

[Snowqueen]

Laying beside me is a collection of poems by Iqbal.

Here is the translation.

Your peaks are matching with the Pleiades in elegance
Though you are standing on earth your abode is sky’s expanse

Bang-e-Dra (The Himalayas) by Allama Iqbal

[mande2013]

"Vers la fin du premier mois, cette fille, obligée de garder la maison un dimanche, entama la conversation avec César."

-Cesar Birotteau, Honore de Balzac

[Mathor]

"And it is not like her to choose a catspaw who would make such a royal botch of the killing." - George R. R. Martin, A Storm of Swords

[bookowskee]

Lennox looks out into the street and sees a white van, brilliant magnesium sunlight reflecting from it as it pauses at traffic lights.


Crime, Irvine Welsh

[bouquin]

Only don't look anywhere else.

[Snowqueen]

"I went to my table, looking straight before me, and immediately paid penalty of gaucherie by knocking over the vase of stiff anemones as I unfolded my napkin."

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

In the Noone of night,
till the firedrake hath oregon you.

From Ben Jonson - Two Gypsy Songs

[KingMarley]

"Well, and how is your Zemstvo getting on?" - Anna Karenina

[coeus]

"Afterward the pilot flew north and received a medal." - Inside Out & Back Again - Thanhha Lai

[Snowqueen]

''Even Okonkwo himself became very fond of the boy - inwardly of course.''



Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

[*Classic*Charm*]

"And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan, and opened his cigarette-case"

- Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray

[bookowskee]

Edith kept reassuring her youngest child that the Vonneguts would rise to the top again, and would resume his "proper place in society" when the bad times ended and "would swim with members of other leading families at the Indianapolis Athletic Club, would play tennis and golf with them at the Woodstock Golf and Country Club."

And So It Goes Kurt Vonnegut: A Life by Charles J. Shields

[LiraelG]

"I was holding my breath.' - Life of Pi, Yann Martel

[papillondemai]

No one has a sense of humor.

[*Classic*Charm*]

No one has a sense of humor.

Perhaps if something were funny...

[Pen Name]

"For the war that was seen to be coming Wollweber was assigned the task of sabotaging Germany's sea-borne supplies."

Struggle in the Dark, (How Russian and other Iron curtain spies operate) J. Bernard Hutton, 1969, Pub. George Harrap.

And to the above postings.

Even funny books would be unlikely to have a humerous point at a specific place, namely page 23 sentence 4.

[papillondemai]

Perhaps if something were funny...

Ouch!

[Pensive]

'To dine alone or to sit alone after dinner was flat rebellion to be fought with every weapon of underhand stealth or of open appeal.' - Night and Day by Virginia Woolf

[bouquin]

'C'est entendu, Monsieur,' the patronne said.

[papayahed]

Then we talked about the name of the magazine, which I thought was brilliant. - The Savage Detective by Robert Bolano

[Justin Dielmann]

It had a peculiar attraction for this immoral wretch, who had before this admired only the coarser types of feminine beauty.

[Ainsley]

"Lucid veterans learn to test reality in two ways; pain and gravity."

~ The Lucid Dreamer by Malcolm Godwin

[Snowqueen]

He would have filled his glass, but there was no drink left.


Crime and Punishment by Dostoyevsky

[bouquin]

K turned to his mother.

[bouquin]

The opening of the cell door brought me awake.

[mal4mac]

"He had heard that women often love unattractive, simple people, but he did not believe it, because he judged by himself, and he only loved beautiful, mysterious and special women." Tolstoy, Anna K

[Snowqueen]

It is sensibly planned, with a redbrick club on its brow, and farther back a grocer's and a cemetery, and the bungalows are disposed along roads that intersect at right angles.

A passage to India by E. M. Forster

[tailor STATELY]

"The mighty merchant smiled." .............. Emily Dickinson, Collected Poems

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY

[YSiobhan]

haha "He walked into the room with caution."

[Gregory Samsa]

"We can't ever be friends again." - John Fowles, The Magus.

[coeus]

"All of the clocks in the room had wound down - the tambours and carriage clocks on the mantel, the banjo and mirror and Viennese regulator on the walls, the Chelsea ship's bells on the rolltop desk, the ogee on the end table, and the seven-foot walnut-cased Stevenson grandfather's clock, made in Nottingham in 1801, with its moon-phase window on the dial and pair of robins threading flowery buntings around the Roman numerals." - Tinkers by Paul Harding

Wow, a long one. :)

[EllieMorse]

"Deborah's complexion was mottling with red."

"An American Dream" by Norman Mailer

[bouquin]

I said nothing.

[kiki1982]

"Do the Mammoth publish you too?"

PG Wodehouse, Something New/Fresh, 1915

I believe what ensues between these two people who met 2 minute ago because she laughed at him doing Larsen Exercise 1, is summig up Facebook way ahead of time:

" - ...Why, we are comrades in misfortune - fellow serfs. We should be friends. Shall we be friends?
- I should be delighted.
- Shall we shake hands, sit down and talk about ourselves a little?
- But I am keeping you from your work.
- An errand of mercy."

That could be Facebook, couldn't it. Oh, we're colleagues, we have to be friends on Facebook... Even down to the 'I'm keeping you from your work.' PG Wodehouse was such an observant man he could even see into the future... :D

[chirpy]

I then reflected - and the thought made me shiver that the creature whom I had left in my apartment might still be there - alive and walking about.
-Mary Shelley, Frankenstien

[Vota]

At first the Lacedaemonians trusted the words of Themistocles, through their friendship for him; but when others arrived, all distinctly declaring that the work was going on and already attaining some elevation, they did not know how to disbelieve it.

Thucydides: The History of the Peloponnesian War

[Snowqueen]

"O Conspiracy,
Sham’st thou to show thy dang’rous brow by night,
When evils are most free?"

Julius Caesar by Shakespeare

[Oedipus]

"At the same time, we tend to take pleasure in the notion that great men are, in various ways, human, all too human"

Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (Pg. 23 is in the Introduction)

[bouquin]

'What do you mean?' asked Gerstäcker uncomprehendingly, but without waiting for an answer he spoke to the horse and they moved on again.

[EvoWarrior5]

"In his working clothes, Joe was a well-knit characteristic-looking blacksmith; in his holiday clothes, he was more like a scarecrow in good circumstances, than anything else."

Charles Dickens, Great Expectations.

[Snowqueen]

"They were called criminals, and the outraged law, like the bursting shells had to come to them, an insoluble mystery from the sea."

Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad

[Morrighan]

What a fabulous thread to stumble upon, right after registration! Also Hi everyone :-)

"They were the only group that consistently refused to acknowledge the gods of their neighbours, send gifts to their temples or participate in festivals honouring these gods."

From - A Convenient Hatred: The History of Antisemitism by Harold Evans and Phyllis Goldstein

[kiki1982]

I know, great thread, isn't it.

Welcome :wave:

[bouquin]

I pay my taxes and insurance myself.

[kiki1982]

'He loved to consort with low people.'

Doctor Thorne, Anthony Trollope, 1858

[Babyguile]

She learned circumspection, judgement, the need for strict self-control and the virtues of silence - but also the necessity to speak out for herself, with all her courage and eloquence, when the occasion demanded.

[Calidore]

Bit of synchronicity here:

"The cold was bitter; he guessed several degrees of frost already, and the worst of the night was still to come." -- Pavane by Keith Roberts.

[108 fountains]

They don't believe in God, but they pretend to because their charges, they think, need this belief.

The Problem of the Soul, Owen Flanagan, 2002

One thing that makes this a great thread is the great writing it contains, proof that great writers make every sentence, every word, count.

[Delta40]

...then rolled a joint, lit up the dollar/franc debate.

Having Fled the Cite Universitaire - Robert Graves

[Victoria Laza]

I looked like I wasn't at a cocktail party but an airport, waiting for my life to take off.

[bouquin]

"Interpreter, this is Lavonnya over at Triple A."

[bouquin]

Here, indeed, was a map of a kind, presumptuous where it was not a blank.

[bouquin]

Il fit sensation.

[DATo]

Can anyone here please explain to me why this thread is so popular? What possible significance does "the 4th sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside my hand" have to do with anything? What is the importance of its revelation to anyone living or dead? What insights or contribution does it make to the world of literature or anything else? Why would anyone take the time to look up and then post "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside his or her hand?

I realize I'm getting old but has the world changed so much in my lifetime that people in the present would consider taking the time to look up and post " the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside their hand"? Is anyone actually and seriously interested in what "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside anyone's hand" actually says?

[Buckthorn]

I think its just a random game/thread that gets members talking and also encourages people to discuss what they are reading at the moment.

Its not particularly sensible but I have never been a fan of being sensible :smile5:

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

Can anyone here please explain to me why this thread is so popular? What possible significance does "the 4th sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside my hand" have to do with anything? What is the importance of its revelation to anyone living or dead? What insights or contribution does it make to the world of literature or anything else? Why would anyone take the time to look up and then post "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside his or her hand?

I realize I'm getting old but has the world changed so much in my lifetime that people in the present would consider taking the time to look up and post " the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside their hand"? Is anyone actually and seriously interested in what "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside anyone's hand" actually says?

Good Sunday morning DATo and welcome. This thread caught my eye sometime back to the point that I’ve been compelled to contribute from time to time. Below I offered my thoughts to your questions.

1..Can anyone here please explain to me why this thread is so popular?

R: It’s a catchy, random little respite from the more heady threads out there.
Think of it as a perpetual double dutch jump rope game taking place in the alley. There you are out on the forum bogged down in a scrum against Joyce, Plato, Tolstoy, etc., suddenly you desire to break out for a brief moment of mindless fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Isx1Q5wyJZg

2..What possible significance does "the 4th sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside my hand" have to do with anything?

R:..No more than the 8th sentence on the 46th page, but again; it’s the randomness at play here.

3..What is the importance of its revelation to anyone living or dead?

R:..For the living, a glimpse into the life of the poster such as their reading interests, trends. Maybe spark interest toward a book or author for a young reader that happens by.
For the dead, authors at least, the name lives on. Can we name the 23rd Spartan out of 300? (Here’s where Calidor will jump in with the name), but we know damn well who wrote Hamlet. (or do we?...duhn, duhn, duhhhn). My post below, brings back fond memories of my deceased father.

4..What insights or contribution does it make to the world of literature or anything else?

R:..See number 3 response for the living, particularly the young reader.

5..Why would anyone take the time to look up and then post "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside his or her hand?

R:..See response to number 1 above. I’ll add that given the stipulation that the book is readily available beside the hand, the time to find the sentence is drastically reduced versus, let’s say, having to go the library and find the book beside your hand.

6..I realize I'm getting old but has the world changed so much in my lifetime that people in the present would consider taking the time to look up and post " the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside their hand"?

R:..For us old timers, (I’m 51 can I consider myself OT?) I actually admire those people of the present, presuming you are referring to younger people, who take time to disconnect from the Gaga’s, gadgets and post Goldsmith.

7…Is anyone actually and seriously interested in what "the 4th Sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside anyone's hand" actually says?

R:..Let’s thank God on this beautiful Sunday morning, we have a few, albeit endangered species left, who would still take interest in “the 4th sentence on the 23rd page…”

Consider the large chunk of society, that invasive species, who would rather spend time Keeping Up With the Kardashians

------------

Whew…okay here’s what I found by my hand…

(click on thumbnail for larger image)

Page 23 turned out to be a table showing the performance of the 4th stage “Altair” motor.

http://i963.photobucket.com/albums/ae114/tabuka1/th_e0fe2fe1c73848aec7bcbbe43c4dee39_zps0018cc24.jp g (http://s963.photobucket.com/user/tabuka1/media/e0fe2fe1c73848aec7bcbbe43c4dee39_zps0018cc24.jpg.h tml)


http://i963.photobucket.com/albums/ae114/tabuka1/th_4eaf15ce1c771b68d2e9e301ed7c3381_zpscff29e76.jp g (http://s963.photobucket.com/user/tabuka1/media/4eaf15ce1c771b68d2e9e301ed7c3381_zpscff29e76.jpg.h tml)

My father was a literal rocket scientist who, for most of his career, was guidance systems engineer for the Scout missile program. I happened to have a stack of mementos on the desk, including this^ manual on Scout published by NASA in 1960.

[MajorLordRoxbro]

Can anyone here please explain to me why this thread is so popular? What possible significance does "the 4th sentence on the 23rd page of the book beside my hand" have to do with anything?

You mean to say you don't know that everything points to 23!
I thought everyone did?!

[DATo]

You mean to say you don't know that everything points to 23!
I thought everyone did?!

According to Douglas Adams it points to 42 *LOL*

[MajorLordRoxbro]

According to Douglas Adams it points to 42 *LOL*

That's Life, the Universe and Everything, not,
The Number 23 is a 2007 American psychological thriller film written by Fernley Phillips and directed by Joel Schumacher. The film starred Jim Carrey. It was subsequently released on DVD on July 24, 2007 (23 July in the UK), and premiered on HBO on Saturday April 19, 2008.

[bouquin]

"You go to hell," José Arcadio Buendia shouted at him.

[Calidore]

After a long time, forever and ever, she found herself safe among the lions. -- The Chalk Girl by Carol O'Connell

[R.F. Schiller]

"What is the count of the scores or hundreds of years between us?" (Walt Whitman - Crossing Brooklyn Ferry) - Norton Anthology of American Literature, Seventh Edition, Volume C.

[Ruben Meijerink]

As yet, the cautious critic may well regard the one as a fantastic experiment of "mental philosophy," and the other as a mere fashion in logic and epistemology.

Susanne Langer - Philosophy in a New Key

[Calidore]

They call it reaction time. -- The Inner Wheel by Keith Roberts

[Whosis]

Fourth complete sentence?...

There's a college off in the distance and there are roads you are now free to travel.

Eighteen In Cross-country Odyssey by Benjamin Anderson

Only book beside me.