Notable quotes, excerpts, and profound lines.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

CHORUS
As for what’s to come—you’ll know that
when it comes. So let it be.
To know would be to grieve ahead of time.
It’s clear whatever is to happen
will happen, like tomorrow’s dawn.

from Agamemnon, part of The Oresteia by Aeschylus.

Modern translation by Ian Johnston

Bring it on!

[bfisher]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

CHORUS
As for what’s to come—you’ll know that
when it comes. So let it be.
To know would be to grieve ahead of time.
It’s clear whatever is to happen
will happen, like tomorrow’s dawn.

from Agamemnon, part of The Oresteia by Aeschylus.

Modern translation by Ian Johnston

Nice, here is the same passage in the translation by Robert Fagles:

"And we will know the future when it comes.
Greet it too early, weep too soon.
It all comes clear in the light of day."

[bfisher]

Originally Posted by AlexBell

CHORUS
As for what’s to come—you’ll know that
when it comes. So let it be.
To know would be to grieve ahead of time.
It’s clear whatever is to happen
will happen, like tomorrow’s dawn.

from Agamemnon, part of The Oresteia by Aeschylus.

Modern translation by Ian Johnston

You really put me in an Aeschylus mood today

"And there they ring the walls, the young,
the lithe, the handsome hold the graves
they won in Troy; the enemy earth
rides over those who conquered."

from Agamemnon,The Oresteia - Aeschylus (translated by Robert Fagles)

[bfisher]

I hadn't realized before where Robert Graves got the title for his WW1 memoir (or was Fagles inspired by Grave's title, since he was born after Graves published his war memoir?):

"But why weep now?
It’s over for us, over for them.
The dead can rest and never rise again;
no need to call their muster. We’re alive,
do we have to go on raking up old wounds?
Good-bye to all that. Glad I am to say it."

from Agamemnon,The Oresteia by Aeschylus (translated by Robert Fagles)

[bfisher]

A cold fog tonight, very Tom Waits-ish, fog now always makes me think of Tom Wait's song:

"I was misinformed, I was misdirected
Cause the interchange never intersected
Leaving me marooned beneath a bloodshot moon
All upon a foggy night, a foggy night
All upon a foggy night"
- On A Foggy Night, from Nighthawks At The Diner, Tom Waits

[kennyc]

"When you consider things like the stars, our affairs don't seem to matter very much, do they?"
- Virginia Woolf, an English novelist, and essayist who died on this day in 1941.

[badgoodDeb]

The juvenile sea squirt wanders through the sea searching for a suitable rock or hunk of coral to cling to and make its home for life. For this task, it has a rudimentary nervous system. When it finds its spot and takes root, it doesn't need its brain anymore, so it eats it. It's rather like getting tenure. -Daniel Dennett, philosopher, writer, and professor (b. 28 Mar 1942)

[kennyc]

[BenG]

“I'm only the messenger!"
"Now you're the message", Parker told him and shot him.”
― Richard Stark, Butcher's Moon

[AlexBell]

This was probably a law of social life: the less an evil was understood, the more fiercely and coarsely it was attacked.

The prosecutor ... could not help thinking that very often the punishment did a great deal more harm than the crime itself.

Anton Chekhov, in 'Home'.

[covingtoncat73]

From "The Book of Lost Things: A Novel" by John Connolly -

“You mean… they killed her?” asked David.

“They ate her,” said Brother Number One. “With porridge. That’s what ‘ran away and was never seen again’ means in these parts. It means ‘eaten.’”

“Um, and what about ‘happily ever after’?” asked David, a little uncertainly. “What does that mean?”

“Eaten quickly,” said Brother Number One."

[bfisher]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

From "The Book of Lost Things: A Novel" by John Connolly -

“You mean… they killed her?” asked David.

“They ate her,” said Brother Number One. “With porridge. That’s what ‘ran away and was never seen again’ means in these parts. It means ‘eaten.’”

“Um, and what about ‘happily ever after’?” asked David, a little uncertainly. “What does that mean?”

“Eaten quickly,” said Brother Number One."

[kennyc]

"I know it's March when my nose starts running and I can't catch it."
- Kenny A. Chaffin

[BenG]

“With regard to religion, finally, it may be briefly said that she believed in God in much the same way as she believed in Australia. For she had no doubts whatever as to the existence of either; and she went to church on Sunday in much the same spirit as she would look at a kangaroo in the zoological gardens; for kangaroos came from Australia.”

― E.F. Benson, Queen Lucia

[covingtoncat73]

“'I doubt very seriously whether anyone will hire me.'

What do you mean, babe? You a fine boy with a good education.'

'Employers sense in me a denial of their values.' He rolled over onto his back. 'They fear me. I suspect that they can see that I am forced to function in a century I loathe. This was true even when I worked for the New Orleans Public Library.”
― John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces