Learning why one great book is just like every other great book is the key to understanding literature

Learning why one great book is just like every other great book is the key to understanding literature

Literature, the most seductive, the most deceiving, the most dangerous of professions.

Literature, the most seductive, the most deceiving, the most dangerous of professions.

The universe is made up of stories, not of atoms.

The universe is made up of stories, not of atoms.

Nothing but blackness aboveAnd nothing that moves but the cars...God, if you wish for our love,Fling us a handful of read more

Nothing but blackness aboveAnd nothing that moves but the cars...God, if you wish for our love,Fling us a handful of stars! - Caliban in the Coal Mines.

A great literature is chiefly the product of inquiring minds in revolt against the immovable certainties of the nation.

A great literature is chiefly the product of inquiring minds in revolt against the immovable certainties of the nation.

Yet ah! why should they know their fate?Since sorrow never comes too late,And happiness too swiftly flies.Thought would destroy their read more

Yet ah! why should they know their fate?Since sorrow never comes too late,And happiness too swiftly flies.Thought would destroy their paradise.No more; where ignorance is bliss,'Tis folly to be wise. - Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College.

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its read more

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.

In literature as in ethics, there is danger, as well as glory, in being subtle. Aristocracy isolates us.

In literature as in ethics, there is danger, as well as glory, in being subtle. Aristocracy isolates us.

Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of a man -- the biography of the man himself cannot be written.

Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of a man -- the biography of the man himself cannot be written.