There's life for you. Spend the best years of your life studying penmanship and rhetoric and syntax and Beowulf and George Eliot, and then somebody steals your pencil.
Dorothy ParkerRead
My land is bare of chattering folk; / the clouds are low along the ridges, / and sweet's the air with curly smoke / from all my burning bridges.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on solitude and the repercussions of past actions.
Dorothy Parker's quote illustrates a moment of introspection in isolation, highlighting the feelings evoked by both the absence of people and the remnants of past relationships or decisions, symbolized by 'burning bridges.' The imagery suggests that even in solitude, there is a certain sweetness in the air, indicating acceptance or peace with one's choices, despite their consequences.
In practice
In a speech about embracing change in life, one might say this quote to emphasize the importance of moving on from past decisions.
There's life for you. Spend the best years of your life studying penmanship and rhetoric and syntax and Beowulf and George Eliot, and then somebody steals your pencil.
Prince or commoner, tenor or bass, Painter or plumber or never-do-well, Do me a favor and shut your face - Poets alone should kiss and tell.
They say of me, and so they should, It's doubtful if I come to good. I see acquaintances and friends Accumulating dividends And making enviable names In science, art and parlor games. But I, despite expert advice, Keep doing things I think are nice, And though to good I never come Inseparable my nose and thumb.
It is that word 'hunny,' my darlings, that marks the first place in The House at Pooh Corner at which Tonstant Weader fwowed up.
I canβt write five words but that I change seven.
For this my mother wrapped me warm,_x000D_ _x000D_ And called me home against the storm,_x000D_ _x000D_ And coaxed my infant nights to quiet,_x000D_ _x000D_ And gave me roughage in my diet,_x000D_ _x000D_ And tucked me in my bed at eight,_x000D_ _x000D_ And clipped my hair, and marked my weight,_x000D_ _x000D_ And watched me as I sat and stood:_x000D_ _x000D_ That I might grow to womanhood_x000D_ _x000D_ To hear a whistle and drop my wits_x000D_ _x000D_ And break my heart to clattering bits.
A man with a machine and inadequate culture is a pestilence.
It is time that scientists and other public intellectuals observed that the contest between faith and reason is zero-sum.
I have outlasted all desire, My dreams and I have grown apart; My grief alone is left entire, The gleamings of an empty heart. The storms of ruthless dispensation Have struck my flowery garland numb, I live in lonely desolation And wonder when my end will come. Thus on a naked tree-limb, blasted By tardy winter's whistling chill, A single leaf which has outlasted Its season will be trembling still.
Everyone finds justification for his or her views in logic and analysis, but a personal philosophy often emerges from some archaic part of the mind, an early idea of how the world should be.
My own business always bores me to death; I prefer other people's.
A tyrant... is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader.
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