A Quote by Anthony Burgess
A perverse nature can be stimulated by anything. Any book can be used as a pornographic instrument, even a great work of literature if the mind that so uses it is off-balance. I once found a small boy masturbating in the presence of the Victorian steel-engraving in a family Bible.
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The Bible is forbidding when you start to read it. The language is odd. The stories start and stop herkily-jerkily. The characters behave in inexplicable ways. It takes a little bit of time to get into the rhythm of the book. I found reading the first 15 chapters of Genesis very very difficult. Once I got past there, I loved reading, and found it very easy. When you get used to the Bible, it becomes thrilling to read (like any great book - I just had exactly the same experience with the Odyssey).
You're sad-looking," she said. "My grandson used to be such a happy boy. He used to write me stories. I remember the first story he ever wrote me, 'Once upon a time, there was a boy.' And that became 'Once upon a time there was a boy who wanted to fly.' And they kept getting better and better over time. I never found out if the boy got to fly." I gave her a small smile. If only she knew the boy's wings had been clipped.
We are estranged from our own deeper physiology because we are no longer in contact with nature. Instead, we are controlling nature with air pollution, heating, technology. But you have to know you have a depth within yourself which needs to be stimulated. If it doesn't get stimulated it becomes weaker, like a muscle that's not being used any more.
I once stole a pornographic book that was printed in braille. I used to rub the dirty parts.
The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. To put it more accurately... you usually don't use it at all. It uses you.
I was once a graduate student in Victorian literature, and I believe as the Victorian novelists did, that a novel isn't simply a vehicle for private expression, but that it also exists for social examination. I firmly believe this.
Even in modern art, artists have used methods based on calculation, inasmuch as these elements, alongside those of a more personal and emotional nature, give balance and harmony to any work of art.
There is a quiet revolution going on in the study of the Bible. At its center is a growing awareness that the Bible is a work of literature and that the methods of literary scholarship are a necessary part of any complete study of the Bible.
If you can imagine the story of the world as a giant movie, to not have some understanding of the Bible - its story, its history, and its impact - would be like watching a great movie and removing part of the plot. It can't be done. The real truth is that everyone regardless of faith tradition benefits from knowing and understanding these aspects of the Bible. It enhances one's knowledge of literature, science, art etc. It's difficult to read any classic work of literature for instance and not see biblical allusions.
In a way, the sense of quality has improved, the status symbol of the small things is gone, and it is acceptable to use stainless steel, even if the neighbour uses silver.
Twisted and perverse are the ways of the human mind," Jane intoned. "Pinocchio was such a dolt to try to become a real boy. He was much better off with a wooden head.
Women have to make a living. We don't live in a wealthy world where we even have a choice. We're losing our choice of whether or not we need to work. If we want to work, we obviously should work and have that choice, but a lot of women can't even get to the word "want." They need to work. And it's great to see women who needed to work and found a way to become a firefighter or a steel worker. That, to me, is very exciting.
While the body is young and fine, the soul blunders, but as the body grows old it attains its highest power. Again, every good soul uses mind; but no body can produce mind: for how should that which is without mind produce mind? Again, while the soul uses the body as an instrument, it is not in it; just as the engineer is not in his engines (although many engines move without being touched by any one).
As a very small boy, my passion was nature, and I had pets - cats, a dog and a bunny rabbit - and I wrote a very small book called 'My Pets,' filled with their photographs and a discussion about my pets and how much I loved them... That was my first book.
There is still a very strong subculture of people who want to do great things on an instrument, and who are stimulated by hearing people who can. That's reassuring. But it's gonna take a person - and I don't know who this is - to come along and reinvent the guitar as a virtuosic instrument in a completely different realm than any of us have done, or anybody else in the past. That's the clincher. Maybe that will happen and maybe it won't.
Western literature has been more influenced by the Bible than any other book.
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