And of course, that makes it frightening to start a new book because you can’t really depend upon what you’ve done with previous books.
ALAN LIGHTMANWhat I am very disturbed about is this trend of everything happening faster and faster and faster and there being more and more general noise in the world, and less and less time for quiet reflection on who we are, and where we’re going.
More Alan Lightman Quotes
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No one ever expects poetry to sell…
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Originality is also very important to a writer. And all of the writers I’ve mentioned, of course, are original, but it’s important to me that every book that I do be really a completely fresh and new look at the world.
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Oh, love is very much a physical thing…. I realize that it’s very complicated, and I’m sure it can’t be traced to individual neurons and hormones, but I think it’s very much a physiological sensation that takes place in the brain.
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And since the human mind has a degree of infinity and imagination unlikely to be matched by a machine for a very, very long time, I don’t think that we will become the machines of the machines.
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The tragedy of this world is that everyone is alone. For a life in the past cannot be shared with the present.
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Faith is the ability to honor stillness at some moments, and at others to ride the passion and exuberance.
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For my students who are trying to learn the craft of writing in a writing class – contemporary literature is what’s most useful.
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I would bet most people don’t have thirty minutes in a day where they can just sit down and think. Or maybe they don’t have to be sitting, they can be walking.
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I think that the scienti?c way of looking at the world, and the humanistic way of looking at the world are complementary.
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And if the present has little effect on the future, present actions need not be weighed for their consequence.
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Sadness is no more than a bit of acid transfixed in the cerebellum.
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Sons never escape from the shadows of their fathers. Nor do daughters of their mothers. No one ever comes into his own…Such is the cost of immortality. No person is whole. No person is free.
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You’ve made something grand, but it will be grander if it has feeling and beauty and harmony.
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I consider myself a spiritual atheist.
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A good book changes for you every few years because you are in a different place in your own life. That’s a sign of a good novel.
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