Category: Quotations

Writers and Their Imaginations

(c) Walker Art Gallery; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation
Walker Art Gallery; The Public Catalogue Foundation

“For a consciousness to be capable of imagining…it needs to be free.”
― Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘The Imaginary’.

 

“In a work of fiction, everything is invented, even the things that are not, because once a true event is brought into the realm of the imaginary, it becomes imaginary.”
― Paul Auster, American writer.

 

“Things need not have happened to be true.  Tales and adventures are the shadow truths that will endure when mere facts are dust and ashes and forgotten.”
― Neil Gaiman, ‘The Sandman #19’.

 

“Creativity is the brain’s invisible muscle that, when used and exercised routinely, becomes better and stronger.”
― Ashley Ormon, writer and poet.

 

“Living alone, with no one to consult or talk to, one might easily become melodramatic, and imagine things which had no foundation on fact.”
― Agatha Christie, ‘Murder Is Easy’.

 

“It is only through fiction and the dimension of the imaginary that we can learn something real about individual experience.  Any other approach is bound to be general and abstract.”
― Nicola Chiaromonte, Italian author.

 

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Writing Passion Quotation

Skateboarding

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“Skateboarding is more exciting than regular sports, more fun than going to the gym, cheaper than therapy, quicker than walking, more real than anything else” or you can make them into a chair.

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Public Dangers

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Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947) was a British mathematician, logician and philosopher best known for his work in mathematical logic and the philosophy of science.
To quote Mr Whitehead in full "...For this reason, dictionaries are public dangers, although they are necessities” ― Alfred North Whitehead.

A witty comment or would he have thought the same of IT in the 21st century e.g. Wikipedia and social media?

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

I Agree with Herbert

H G Wells House Plaque
Plaque by the H. G. Wells Society at Chiltern Court, Baker Street in the City of Westminster, London, where Wells lived between 1930 and 1936.

“No compulsion in the world is stronger than the urge to edit someone else’s document” said Herbert George Wells, and I know the feels––Herbert is better recognised as H. G. Wells, an exceptional English author, satirist and biographer (21 Sept 1866 – 13 Aug 1946) who famously wrote The Invisible Man, War of the Worlds and The Time Machine.

I can understand how the fingers of Mr Wells must have itched, his brain must have misfired and his breath must have been shallow as he read a paragraph which badly needed editing.  Indeed, I often wonder how some books (or e-books) get into print when it is glaringly obvious they need a bit of trimming and correction.

Just recently I read an e-book with blurb announcing an award, author kudos and high sales.  Undeserved as far as I’m concerned.  Why?  The author had no idea of descriptive body language.  The best he could do was “He frowned”, “She frowned”, and for variety “He scowled”, “She scowled” until I deleted the book at “She wrinkled her brow”.

How did this get loose and launched on the general reading public?  I’m sure Rule 101 is “If in doubt, substitute ‘said’ and let the dialogue do the work”.  Don’t repeat yourself.  Unpublished as I am, I guess the writer can sneer and say “Well, I got the pay cheque and you didn’t” but I can retort with “Have some integrity.”  Or go back to writing classes.

It’s easy to think “Not all publishing houses are that blind” but, oh, many are.  If you haven’t read a book with an error, you haven’t read enough books.  Pathetically, hardly a week goes by without my subconscious editing a typo or tidying a sentence.  I will never know how efficient I am, whether I am always right, but, man, it makes me feel better!

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Proofreading Copy Editing Banner
Proof-reading is the first step, make it count…

Pixel Girl says…

Pixel Girl Artificial Intelligence 02

Interpreted Programming Languages    Functional Programming Languages

Compiled Programming Languages    Procedural Programming Languages

Scripting Programming Languages    Mark-up Programming Languages

Logic-Based Programming Languages    Concurrent Programming Languages

Object-Oriented Programming Languages

Bender Futurama

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Coffee Shop Wisdom

Platitudes, rather hippy dippy and old hat, short sugar-coated sentences designed to bolster the ‘feels’ of a younger generation.  Look again.  Each line creates an emotion, a memory jog, that tingle of happiness to the down-surge of sadness.  Regret is there, the wince for things done wrong, then the smile for laughing out loud when you get it right.  Basic universal rules for living.

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

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Wishes – A Gloomy Quotation

Scottish Castle Dunnottar on Aberdeenshire Coastline 11
“When You Wish Upon a Star” originally sung by Cliff Edwards as Disney’s character Jiminy Cricket in “Pinocchio”

THIS GLOOMY LITTLE QUOTATION WAS AT THE BOTTOM OF MY COMPUTER SCREEN ON JANUARY 2018 COURTESY OF FIREFOX:

“The nearest star is 4.25 light-years from Earth which is why most wishes take at least 9 years to come true.”

IT WON’T STOP ME!

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

First of the Month

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Hopper Studios, Canada, and artwork by Sue Zipkin

When I was a kid we used to say “Pinch and punch for the first of the month” and I don’t know why.  A lot of our practical jokes involved physical actions which resulted in the receiver going “Ow, ouch” and glaring fiercely while rubbing their arm.

This beautiful calendar art was created by Sue Zipkin, produced by Hopper Studios, and I will be sad to see it go.  However, its final words are encouraging “Embrace Change”.  How many of us will actually do that next year?

“A year from now you will wish you had started today.” — Karen Lamb

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Wise and Weird

Yeah Yeah Yeah

♦   What if my dog only brings back the ball because he thinks I like throwing it?

♦   Your future self is watching you right now through memories.

♦   If poison expires, is it more poisonous or is it no longer poisonous?

♦   Which letter is silent in the word “Scent,” the S or the C?

♦   Do twins ever realise that one of them is unplanned?

♦   Why is the letter W, in English, called double U? Shouldn’t it be called double V?

♦   Maybe oxygen is slowly killing you and it just takes 75-100 years to fully work.

♦   Every time you clean something, you just make something else dirty.

♦   The word “swims” upside-down is still “swims”.

♦   One hundred years ago everyone owned a horse and only the rich had cars. Today everyone has cars and only the rich own horses.

♦   The doctors who told Stephen Hawking he had two years to live in 1953 are probably dead.

♦   If you replace “W” with “T” in “What, Where and When” you get the answer to each of them.

♦   Many animals probably need glasses, but nobody knows it.

♦   If you rip a hole in a net, there are actually fewer holes in it than there were before.

♦   Please note I am only the purveyor of these words of weirdly wiseness.

♦   When 22/2/2022 falls on a Tuesday, we’ll just call it “2’s Day”.

♥   Gretchen Bernet-Ward

Calendar Date 22.2.2022
Where will you be on Twosday?

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Gandhi Possessions

Mahatma Gandhi, Indian political and spiritual leader (1869-1948) said “The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems” and “Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it” because who knows what is around the next bend…

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward