"Stories have changes, my dear boy,” the man in the grey suit says, his voice almost imperceptibly sad. “There are no more battles between good and evil, no monsters to slay, no maidens in need to recue. Most maidens are perfectly capable of rescuing themselves in my experience, at least the ones worth something, in any case. There are no longer simple tales with quests and beasts and happy endings. The quests lack clarity of goal or path. The beasts take different forms and are difficult to recognize for what they are. And there are never really endings, happy or otherwise. Things keep overlapping and blur, your story is part of your sister’s story is part of many other stories, and there in no telling where and of them may lead. Good and evil are a great deal more complex than a princess and a dragon, or a wolf and a scarlet-clad little girl. And is not the dragon the hero of his own story? Is not the wolf simply acting as a wolf should act? Though perhaps it is a singular wolf who goes to such lengths as to dress as a grandmother to toy with its prey."

— Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

3 months ago

"Someone needs to tell those tales. When the battles are fought and won and lost, when the pirates find their treasures and the dragons eat their foes for breakfast with a nice cup of Lapsang souchong, someone needs to tell their bits of overlapping narrative. There’s magic in that. It’s in the listener, and for each and every ear it will be different, and it will affect them in ways they can never predict. From the mundane to the profound. You may tell a tale that takes up residence in someone’s soul, becomes their blood and self and purpose. That tale will move them and drive them and who knows what they might do because of it, because of your words. That is your role, your gift. Your sister may be able to see the future, but you yourself can shape it, boy. Do not forget that…there are many kinds of magic, after all."

— Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

♥ 13 notes

3 months ago

Phrases to thank The Bard for

(via nataliastark)

♥ 69,962 notes

4 months ago

"If you’re twenty-two, physically fit, hungry to learn and be better, I urge you to travel - as far and as widely as possible. Sleep on floors if you have to. Find out how other people live and eat and cook. Learn from them- wherever you go."

— Anthony Bourdain (via b0ld—as—l0ve)

(Source: thatkindofwoman, via starsmasquerading)

♥ 3,769 notes

4 months ago

Reasoning With Vampires: New Moon »

reasoningwithvampires:

What I hate the most about New Moon: Meyer romanticized suicide.

I understand that teenagers (and grown-ups, too) have volatile emotions. A broken heart really can seem like the end of the world. People get depressed and feel like they have nothing to live for. I know.

Though I’m not a person…

Agreed

♥ 1,377 notes

4 months ago

“I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in
F. W.”

Jane Austen, Persuasion

♥ 15 notes

4 months ago

"If you don’t like to read you haven’t found the right book."

— J. K. Rowling (via rosefeather)

(Source: perturbations, via prettybooks)

♥ 26,665 notes

4 months ago

"The second time he had simply typed the words something beautiful into the Google images box. Up came a picture of some leaves against the sun. A picture of a blonde photoshop-smooth woman and baby sleeping. A picture of a bird. A picture of mother Teresa. A picture of a modernist building made of shiny metal. A picture of two people sticking knives into their own hands. Google is so strange. It promises everything, but everything isn’t there. You type in the words for what you need, and what you need becomes superfluous in an instant, shadowed instantaneously by the things you really need, and none of them answerable by Google."

— There But For The by Ali Smith

♥ 1 note

4 months ago

There But For The by Ali Smith

Published September 2011

Literary fiction isn’t everyone’s cup of tea - but it certainly is mine. Having just finished There But For The this afternoon, I wanted to throw my recommendation out there. I chose this book (audiobook actually) without knowing anything about the author, just having read the book jacket summary and I was more than pleasantly surprised. Smith’s writing shows a mastery of craft that’s at once exciting, true-to-life, and still inventive: the witty and hilarious dialogue at the dinner party (though this extends to parts of the whole novel), the child’s Alice in Wonderland-esque questions and puns, May’s stream of consciousness memories (in particular) interrupting her present, Anne’s first conversation with young Miles on the tour of Europe. Smith creates a lifelike portrait of each character in this novel, and in turn, brings out the best of humanity through their thoughts and histories. I felt connected to each of them. It was a beautifully constructed book.

For a reread, I’d probably go with a print copy, though I enjoyed the audiobook rendition immensely (and all the accents that came with it) - I’ve heard things about poetry-like formatting and enigmatic brackets and now I’m interested.

♥ 1 note

4 months ago