Writing quotes that I now love =D

"People have writer's block not because they can't write, but because they despair of writing eloquently."
Anna Quindlen

"The writer who cares more about words than about story (characters, action, setting, atmosphere) is unlikely to create a vivid and continuous dream; he gets in his own way too much; in his poetic drunkenness, he can't tell the cart--and its cargo--from the horse."
John Gardner

"A book worth reading only in childhood is not worth reading even then."
C.S. Lewis

"Unlike politicians, storytellers know that you cannot sever reality from reality: all you are entitled to do is to re-imagine the world in order better to see and understand it."
Alberto Manguel

"You never learn how to write a novel. You just learn how to write the novel that you're writing."
Gene Wolfe, paraphrased by Neil Gaiman

"You can take for granted that people know more or less what a street, a shop, a beach, a sky, an oak tree look like. Tell them what makes this one different."
Neil Gaiman

(all quotes found here)

Happiness is...

The other day, I was lost for what to write. I almost started writing some flimsy sentences in the slim hope that it would lead to a brilliant plot, then to an amazing story which I'd publish. (Such dreams. :D)

I almost went to the computer, almost opened up microsoft word and almost typed up the faint sentences in my mind.

Almost.

Except something told me, Y'know, sit down and write something out. It'll be good.

So I did.

And the result (after a half an hour) was a five page plot for a story that I am going to begin to write, this coming school year.

Right now, I'm typing it up (my scrawled handwriting is barely legible, even for me) and getting the logistics of everything down (most everything). I'm taking names from other failed story attempts (all without real plots, mind you) and putting them into this story.

I have a feeling that the story that I am now starting to develop is good, and I have an inkling (as well as a hope) that the plot may be good as well. I'm going to share it with some close friends and see what they think. (After it's typed up, that is.)

So to finish the title: Happiness is finishing a five page plot after half an hour.

Beautiful. ;)

Several Quotes that I really like

A work of art is a world in itself reflecting senses and emotions of the artist's world.
Hans Hofmann

Sound is the vocabulary of nature.
Pierre Schaeffer

A man should look for what is, and not for what he thinks should be.
Albert Einstein

History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.
Maya Angelou

An injured friend is the bitterest of foes.
Thomas Jefferson

Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company.
George Washington

A child miseducated is a child lost.
John F. Kennedy

A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.
Theodore Roosevelt

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other.
Abraham Lincoln

If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.
Ronald Reagan

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.
John Adams

All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.
Thomas E. Lawrence

A picture is a poem without words.
Horace

An artist cannot fail; it is a success to be one.
Charles Horton Cooley

An artist is a dreamer consenting to dream of the actual world.
George Santayana

He who devotes sixteen hours a day to hard study may become at sixty as wise as he thought himself at twenty.
Mary Wilson Little

And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.
William Shakespeare

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.
Aldous Huxley

Quotes found at Brainy Quote.

Frayed Ribbons

A box lay untouched on her closet floor. It had been undisturbed for so many long years, that she had almost forgotten.
But now she needed it, she needed it as something to give to herself. If nothing more than a fond memory.

She sat down on her bed and lifted the lid from the cardboard box, smiling faintly.
Inside, lay many pairs of ballet shoes, worn from wear. Her wrinkled fingers stroked the frayed ribbons of one and she closed her eyes, remembering.

She remembered when she had gotten her first pair of ballet shoes, how excited she was at the tender age of six.

She had gotten her second pair on her tenth birthday, as a present because her other shoes were too small. She chuckled as she saw the brown stain on them, because she had not taken them off during her party, and as a result they were stained with coffee.

The third pair was the most special to her, she had first gotten her pointe shoes when she was only a girl of fourteen. A young wisp of a thing with big hopes and bigger dreams.

The rest of the memories blurred and she paused to let what was left of them sink in. For now it seemed as if they were mere rags of the past, frayed ribbons that held nothing, unless you could see past the thread and into the soul. She glanced at them once more, then shut the lid to the box, enclosing the memories within them.

Until they were needed again.

Written for Writing on the Weekends.





Yes, I know, it's a terrible short story, but I didn't have time to fix it. :P

Completely HILARIOUS (for Jane Austen Fans)

Found this link on Hat Full Of Hope...completely hilarious. It was so funny...I can't wait to show it to my mom when she gets back. Here are some of my favorite parts (though I would recommend reading it all the way through. :P)

	Lydia Bennet became a fan of Officers.
	Kitty Bennet became a fan of Officers

Elizabeth Bennet and Caroline Bingley are attending the event Take a Turn about the Room.

	William Collins is paying his attentions to Jane Bennet.
	William Collins is paying his attentions to Elizabeth Bennet.

	Mrs. Bennet joined the group Widows of Men Killed in Duels.
	Mary Bennet is consoling herself with moral extractions from the evil before her.
	Mr. Bennet is back home and feeling guilty... but it will pass away soon enough.
	Mrs. Bennet left the group Widows of Men Killed in Duels.

Quotes from L. M. Montgomery

I just love L. M. Montgomery's writings. They all have such a beautiful, poetic feel to them. Therefore, I decided to post some wonderful quotes from her books. (The ones which have no book title are the one's which she herself quoted)

"I'd like to add some beauty to life," said Anne dreamily. "I don't exactly want to make people KNOW more. . .though I know that IS the noblest ambition. . .but I'd love to make them have a pleasanter time because of me. . .to have some little joy or happy thought that would never have existed if I hadn't been born."

This one is wonderful. Just what I want to do as well. Wouldn't it be nice to get to heaven and you've accomplished that?

"I love to see the snow come down in slanting lines against the dark trees." Emily Climbs

It is rather pretty to see that.

"Isn't it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes me feel glad to be alive--it's such an interesting world. It wouldn't be half so interesting if we know all about everything, would it? There'd be no scope for imagination then, would there?" Anne of Green Gables

What a joy it is to be able to figure things out! To imagine upon ideas and thoughts. How dull life would be if we knew everything. Nothing would be a challenge. Nothing would tempt us, because we would know all there was to know.

"You can paint the weakness and foolishness and wickedness of a character in a way that is positively uncanny, in a girl of your age. But--is it worth while, Emily?" Emily Climbs

No, it is not. Instead, we should be painting all that is good, and beautiful, and just.

"she was richer in those dreams than in realities; for things seen pass away, but the things that are unseen are eternal." Anne of Windy Poplars

Oh, what a terribly magical quote. It strikes such a powerful ache within me.

"I don't think the trouble is in her mind. She has a sick soul." Emily Climbs

The thought of a sick soul is a terrible one.

"I couldn't live where there were no trees-something vital in me would starve." Anne's House of Dreams

Yes...what on earth would we do without the whispers of trees? Can you imagine having none at all?

"Those who can soar to the highest heights can also plunge to the deepest depths and the natures which enjoy most keenly are those which also suffer most sharply."

So those of us may suffer, yet we shall suffer gloriously.

". . . there's no use trying to live in other people's opinions. The only thing to do is live in your own."Emily Climbs

Live as the person that God created you as! Break free of the earthly chains of "how you should be", and become the one that God meant for you to be.

"Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it." The Story Girl

What a beautiful thought. It brings to mind faded letters with dried rose petals in an old chest...

"Perhaps, after all, romance did not come into one’s life with pomp and blare, like a gay knight riding down; perhaps it crept to one’s side like an old friend through quiet ways; perhaps it revealed itself in seeming prose, until some sudden shaft of illumination flung athwart its pages betrayed the rhythm and the music; perhaps . . . perhaps . . . love unfolded naturally out of a beautiful friendship, as a golden-hearted rose slipping from its green sheath." Anne of Avonlea

*Deep sigh* Very beautiful.

"I am simply a "book drunkard." Books have the same irresistible temptation for me that liquor has for its devotee. I cannot withstand them." From One of her Journals (or something...)

I think that this one is very humorous, yet it holds truth for me, as well as any other book devotee; that I am sure. :D

"I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens, but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls slipping off a string."

One of my all time favorite quotes. I don't think it really needs explanation at all.

"Oh, it's delightful to have ambitions. I'm so glad I have such a lot. And there never seems to be any end to them-- that's the best of it. Just as soon as you attain to one ambition you see another one glittering higher up still. It does make life so interesting." Anne of Green Gables

It does, doesn't it? :)

"There is such a place as fairyland - but only children can find the way to it. And they do not know that it is fairyland until they have grown so old that they forget the way. One bitter day, when they seek it and cannot find it, they realize what they have lost; and that is the tragedy of life. On that day the gates of Eden are shut behind them and the age of gold is over. Henceforth they must dwell in the common light of common day. Only a few, who remain children at heart, can ever find that fair, lost path again; and blessed are they above mortals. They, and only they, can bring us tidings from that dear country where we once sojourned and from which we must evermore be exiles. The world calls them its singers and poets and artists and story-tellers; but they are just people who have never forgotten the way to fairyland." The Story Girl

What a sad thought...

"It's not what the world holds for you. It's what you bring to it. " Anne of Green Gables

True, in a way.

"If I really wanted to pray I'll tell you what I'd do. I'd go out into a great big field alone or into the deep, deep woods, and I'd look up into the sky - up - up - up- into that lovely blue sky that looks like there's no end to it's blueness. And then I'd just feel a prayer."

Just feel a prayer...ah...that's exactly how I feel sometimes. Real beauty from God seems to give that. Be it nature, music, books, and so on.

The last day of the old year was one of those bright, cold, dazzling winter days, which bombard us with their brilliancy, and command our admiration but never our love.

I do love days like that. The crispness is so apparent in everything.



I have so many more quotes to put up from L. M. Montgomery, but I must go to bed, because it's two minutes till 11 PM. I hope you enjoyed the measly supply I put up, though. :)