My fiction is almost always inspired by a character’s need or desire to rise above him- or herself. No one is perfect and some of us have much adversity in our lives; it is those people who struggle to rise above their nature or background that I find the most interesting and heroic.
An idealist is ahead of his time only in the sense that he is articulate. The same is true of a nation. For even primitive people, even effete races have a message for those above or below them. The heritage of the Ideal, however small can not be exhausted.
For an object under the eye will appear very different from the same object placed above it; in an inclosed space, very different from the same in an open space.
Tacked above my desk are photos of artists I admire – Hopper, Sargent, Twain – and postcards from beloved bookstores where I’ve spent all my time and money – Tattered Cover, Elliot Bay, Harvard Bookstore.
For me, my favorite Mariah Carey songs were never the singles, ever. My favorite Mariah song of all time is ‘Sent From Up Above’ from her first album, or ‘Vanishing,’ songs no one talks about.
Christ’s Church is, above all, the spiritual temple where every Christian knows he has his place: he knows he has it, and he is aware of his duty to keep it with honor, dignity, and grace.
The one who writes a poem writes it above all because verse writing is an extraordinary accelerator of conscience, of thinking, of comprehending the universe.
The emperor is in the Church, not above the Church.
What has bothered and angered radical Muslims is that I’m a non-Muslim writing anything at all about Islam. But this is fiction, and I don’t think Islam is above criticism or fictionalization any more so than Judaism, Christianity, Mormonism or Hinduism is.
I live in Indiana and teach at Purdue University, a wonderful school with some of the brightest students I have ever had the privilege of working with. My colleagues are powerful and intelligent and kind. The cost of living is low, the prairie is wide, and on clear nights, I can see all the stars in the sky above.
Suddenly life has new meaning to me, there’s beauty up above and things we never take notice of, you wake up suddenly you’re in love.
Whatever understanding is reached with Pakistan has to be followed honestly, and everybody will have to rise above party politics and be actively committed to make India prosperous.
I’m easy driving, But I’m not a person who loves living pleasantly above all else. I’m not that way at all. I might think I’m that, but I’m not really that.
When I look up and see the sun shining on the patch of white clouds up in the blue, I begin to think how it would feel to be up somewhere above it winging swiftly thought the clear air, watching the earth below, and the men on it, no bigger than ants.
I’ve never really viewed myself as particularly talented. I’ve viewed myself as slightly above average in talent.
Above all things let us never forget that mankind constitutes one great brotherhood; all born to encounter suffering and sorrow, and therefore bound to sympathize with each other.
Writers are a little below clowns and a little above trained seals.
That’s what my Dad always told me, on the ballot, they should always have a third choice, like none of the above, then if enough people picked that, they’d have to get new candidates.
Every day is a good day above ground, and especially being able to play metal and being able to your craft and everything. You’ve gotta respect that, because it’s something that can be taken away from you really quick.
The wise are above books.
I’ve begun to realize, as I’m getting older, that I was taught to go for a certain kind of stillness to get things done. I missed that in my life. I loved my grandmother’s property, out in South Georgia right above the Florida line, so I just thought I’d find some property where I could feel that again.
When I discovered acting, I decided that’s what I wanted to do above everything else. It was the first time I was passionate about anything.
Above all, I would not expect a wise race, at great expense, to set loose an army of self-replicating robots.
With ‘Brick,’ the style with language and the way it was shot was to create a world obviously elevated from the very first frame above a typical high school.
In days when the public safety is imminently threatened, and the fate of a nation may hang upon a single act, we owe frank speech, above all other men, to him who is highest in authority. I shall speak to you as man to man.
Infinitely more important than sharing one’s material wealth is sharing the wealth of ourselves – our time and energy, our passion and commitment, and, above all, our love.
Everyone has met or seen or interacted with a Nigerian in America because we leave Nigeria for here. We’re your doctors. We’re your lawyers. We’re your child’s best friend. All of the above.
Above all else stands the burning question of bipartisanship. Whatever else the politicians might say they’re about, our news analysts know that this is the true object of the nation’s desire, the topic to which those slippery presidential spokesmen need always to be dragged back.
But I believe above all that I wanted to build the palace of my memory, because my memory is my only homeland.
No one can be a painter unless he cares for painting above all else.
But Wordsworth is the poet I admire above all others.
Above all, in comedy, and again and again since classical times, passages can be found in which the level of representation is interrupted by references to the spectators or to the fictive nature of the play.
The ground we walk on, the plants and creatures, the clouds above constantly dissolving into new formations – each gift of nature possessing its own radiant energy, bound together by cosmic harmony.
The museums and parks are graveyards above the ground- congealed memories of the past that act as a pretext for reality.
There are those who believe that power is up above, and they don’t notice that it’s actually in the hearts of the great masses.
Truth will rise above falsehood as oil above water.
When I began I thought that literature was contained within a bubble that somehow floated above the world commented upon by newspapers. But I became more and more interested in trying to include some of that world within my work.
Dartmoor proper consists of that upland region of granite, rising to nearly 2,000 feet above the sea, and actually shooting above that height at a few points, which is the nursery of many of the rivers of Devon.
I’m a big believer in persistence, don’t be greedy and, above all, work hard. It’s what keeps me going.
The vision that the founding fathers had of rule of law and equality before the law and no one above the law, that is a very viable vision, but instead of that, we have quasi mob rule.
From Watergate we learned what generations before us have known; our Constitution works. And during Watergate years it was interpreted again so as to reaffirm that no one – absolutely no one – is above the law.
I have been in many countries, and I have found there people examining their own love of life, sense of peril, their own common sense. The one thing they cannot understand is why that same love of life, sense of peril and above all common sense, is not invariably shared among their leaders and rulers.
Poets yearn, of course, to be published, read, and understood, but they do little, if anything, to set themselves above the common herd and the daily grind.
Captain Hale, alone, without sympathy or support, save that from above, on the near approach of death asked for a clergyman to attend him. It was refused. He then requested a Bible; that too was refused by his inhuman jailer.
Man is more than merely an animal to exist and propagate his species. His mind gives him capacity to search out the great truths in God’s arrangement and this lifts him far above the other animal creation.
I met children who want to be social workers, lawyers, doctors, community activists and soldiers so they can help their people rise above still difficult economic circumstances.
A great epiphany: I found out that I’m totally confused and I’m good with that. I’m consistently inconsistent. I’m all of the above. I’m OK. I’m a work in progress. That’s my next tattoo somewhere.
No one knows when the man up above wants to call your name.
Above everything else I’ve done, I’ve always said I’ve had more guts than I’ve got talent.
My mum and dad ran a family cafe in Sligo for 35 years and worked long hours. We grew up in a very hard-working family and had a lovely atmosphere, as we lived above the restaurant. It definitely made me want to work hard, whatever I chose to do. As the baby of seven kids, I was definitely a bit spoilt.
A particularly fine head on a man usually means that he is stupid; particularly deep philosophers are usually shallow thinkers; in literature, talents not much above the average are usually regarded by their contemporaries as geniuses.
The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness.
Every civilization is founded on sins – every single one. Dispossession, violence, appropriation. What distinguishes civilizations are the ones who rise above it.
