Happiness is beneficial for the body but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind. – Marcel Proust, The Past Recaptured, Remembrance of Things Past
Would you touch a nettle without being stung by it? take hold of it stoutly. Do the same to other annoyances, and hardly will any thing annoy you. – Augustus William Hare and Julius Charles Hare, Guesses at Truth, by Two Brothers
Life is hard to bear. But do not pretend to be so frail! We are all good he-asses and she-asses of burden. – Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), “Of Reading and Writing,” Thus Spake Zarathus
The buildings that I build very often have a dreamlike reality. I dont mean by that they have a fantasy quality at all, in fact quite the reverse. They contain in some degree the ingredients that give dreams their power… stuff thats very close to us. – Christopher Alexander
The more poetry you have in the head, the more poetry you will understand because you will be getting to the roots of what it is that makes people write poetry at all. – Peter Davison
When I moved out of London 13 years ago, I found a whole other reason not to drive. This was because my new husband Dan, unlike my dad, did drive, and this became a great source of fun and adventure. – Julie Burchill
