The best revenge? Getting on with everything
“The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself.”— Eddie Vedder Something of a voice for Gen X kids like myself, Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder’s quote above has been dished up around the… Read More
Tag: Quotations
60 is the new normal: Jack Nicholson and the very human art of moving the goalposts
“Our generation are the new old. I remember what someone of 60 looked like when I was a kid. They didn’t look like me.”— Jack Nicholson, in 1998 Aging bites, and we all look at… Read More
Good waterfalls make good neighbours: Behind the drop in Canadian visitors to the U.S.
“But to target Canada? I wouldn’t personally poke the eye of my best friend. Diplomacy doesn’t have to become insulting. Negotiations are only cranky if you make them cranky.”— Robert Restaino Robert Restaino is the… Read More
A case for indie movies: Better roles for women, says Vera Famiga
“I’m least challenged or inspired by [Hollywood] stories… I’ve gravitated towards independent cinema because you have to work harder in studio scripts to flesh out characters, particularly female ones. They are not as sharply edged,… Read More
Ideas are well and good. What you need is a voice
“Ideas brush past fleeting and insubstantial as moths. But I let them go, I don’t want them. What I want is a voice.”— Joyce Carol Oates Having turned 88 last month, the American author Joyce… Read More
A thought on opera (and suddenly breaking into song)
“No good opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they are feeling sensible.”— W.H. Auden So wrote the British poet W.H. Auden, during a period of his life after he had… Read More
Revenge (or reinvention) of the passive gardener
“We have things that grow outside of the house but I wouldn’t really call it a garden.”— Roz Chast A prime attraction of The New Yorker for almost five decades, the cartoonist Roz Chast draws… Read More
Flannery O’Connor on how truth is often blunt and unappealing
“The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it emotionally.”— Flannery O’Connor You won’t find photos of the American author Flannery O’Connor as an old woman, nor even really of a middle-aged… Read More
Everyone can recognize a braggart. Getting away can be trickier
“A bore is a fellow who opens his mouth and puts his feats in it.”— Henry Ford Henry Ford’s well-known observation has a decent pun in it, as well as a sharp insight into human… Read More
Self-esteem: Without it, there’s nothing
“I began to understand that self-esteem isn’t everything; it’s just that there’s nothing without it.”— Gloria Steinem Self-esteem has been on my mind a bit lately, for a variety of reasons. One thing that has… Read More
Mordecai Richler and the dilemma of the voracious reader
“I was a voracious reader, but you would be mistaken if you took that as evidence of my quality.”— Mordecai Richler The phrase “voracious reader” can be a loaded one, often without meaning to be…. Read More
Art Spiegelman tried to ditch the family Thomas the Tank Engine books
“I guess I don’t subscribe to the twee school. I remember trying to lose our copy of Thomas the Tank Engine before I had to read it again. Life is a more dimensional and interesting… Read More
Carl Sagan on what strong emotions can do to you (and to rational thought)
“Where we have strong emotions, we’re liable to fool ourselves.”— Carl Sagan Carl Sagan uttered these words in the groundbreaking TV series Cosmos, which aired on PBS in the fall of 1980. Sagan’s documentaries, and… Read More
Revisiting Julia Gillard’s misogyny speech, and its impact around the world
“I will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. I will not. And the government will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. Not now, not ever. The leader… Read More
Nabokov’s caution to writers and other artists (and politicians, too)
“For better or worse, it is the commentator who has the last word.”— Vladimir Nabokov This observation from Vladimir Nabokov is spoken by one of the Russian-American novelist’s characters, and not a nice one, either…. Read More