Skip to main content

A man who is not born with th...

A man who is not born with the novel-writing gift has a troublesome time of it when he tries to build a novel. I know this from experience. He has no clear idea of his story; in fact he has no story. He merely has some people in his mind, and an incident or two, also a locality, and he trusts he can plunge those people into those incidents with interesting results.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

You perceive, now, that these...

You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks - in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Humor, to be comprehensible t...

Humor, to be comprehensible to anybody, must be built upon a foundation with which he is familiar. If he can't see the foundation the superstructure is to him merely a freak -- like the Flatiron building without any visible means of support -- something that ought to be arrested.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Pity is for the living, envy ...

Pity is for the living, envy is for the dead.
Death, the refuge, the solace, the best and kindliest and most prized friend and benefactor of the erring, the forsaken, the old and weary and broken of heart.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

No temperance society which i...

No temperance society which is well officered and which has the real good of our fellow-men in view, will ever get drunk save in the seclusion of its temperance hall.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

If you don't know how to pron...

If you don't know how to pronounce a word, say it loudly. Do not compound mispronunciation with inaudibility

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

The cayote is a living, breat...

The cayote is a living, breathing allegory of Want. He is always hungry. He is always poor, out of luck and friendless. The meanest creatures despise him, and even the fleas would desert him for a velocipede.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Look at the mother of Washing...

Look at the mother of Washington! She raised a boy that could not tell a lie--could not tell a lie! But he never had any chance. It might have been different if he had belonged to the Washington Newspaper Correspondents' Club

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

A country without a patent of...

A country without a patent office and good patent laws is just a crab, and can't travel any way but sideways and backways.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

If I were going to construct ...

If I were going to construct a God I would furnish him with some ways and qualities and characteristics which the Present One lacks... He would spend some of His eternities in trying to forgive Himself for making man unhappy when He could have made him happy with the same effort and He would spend the rest of them in studying astronomy.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

I am personally acquainted wi...

I am personally acquainted with hundreds of journalists, and the opinion of the majority of them would not be worth tuppence in private, but when they speak in print it is the newspaper that is talking (the pygmy scribe is not visible) and then their utterances shake the community like the thunders of prophecy.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Change is the handmaiden Natu...

Change is the handmaiden Nature requires to do her miracles with.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

It's my opinion that every on...

It's my opinion that every one I know has morals, though I wouldn't like to ask. I know I have. But I'd rather teach them than practice them any day. "Give them to others"-that's my motto.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

In my nostrils still lives th...

In my nostrils still lives the breath of flowers that perished twenty years ago.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

The source of all humor is no...

The source of all humor is not laughter, but sorrow.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

As I have said before, I neve...

As I have said before, I never had any large respect for good spelling. That is my feeling yet. Before the spelling-book came with its arbitrary forms, men unconsciously revealed shades of their characters, and also added enlightening shades of expression to what they wrote by their spelling, and so it is possible that the spelling-book has been a doubtful benevolence to us.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Don't just sit there and worr...

Don't just sit there and worry. Be proactive. Do something - anything - about what's worrying you so you can gain information, focus and control over the situation. I've suffered a great many catastrophes in my life. Most of them never happened.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

You don't know about me, with...

You don't know about me, without you have read a book by the name of 'The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,' but that ain't no matter. That book was made by a Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

It is the Creator?s Grand Arm...

It is the Creator?s Grand Army, and he is the Commander-in-Chief... With these facts before you, now try to guess man?s chiefest pet name for this ferocious Commander-in-Chief? I will save you the trouble but you must not laugh. It is Our Father in Heaven.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

History teaches us that whene...

History teaches us that whenever a weak and ignorant people possess a thing which a strong and enlightened people want, it must be yielded up peaceably.

Mark Twain 2884 quotes

Добрые, щедрые, великодушные: 6 советских актеров, которые были всеобщими любимчиками

23

Советских актёров часто ставят в пример как образец духовной силы, национальной гордости и внутренней красоты. Они стали символами эпохи, носителями культуры и нравственности. Но, как известно, за кул...

Десять кинозвезд, которые отлично поют

83

Актеры — люди творческие, но кто бы мог подумать, что некоторые из них скрывают прекрасный голос. В эпоху раннего Голливуда актеров с музыкальными способностями было немало — это считалось скорее норм...

Мэрилин Монро, Ким Кардашьян и другие

115

Неузнаваемая Ким Кардашьян в объективе фотографа Маркуса Клинко, 2009 год. Памела Андерсон в самой первой съёмке для журнала «Playboy», 1990. На фото голливудская актриса Dorothy Lamour и шимпанзе Джи...

Что стало с детьми-звездами: Рэдклифф и компания спустя годы

219

Расскажем, как сложилась судьба актеров, которые начинали сниматься еще в детстве.
Остаться на вершине в Голливуде удаётся не каждому, особенно если путь начался в детстве. Одни актёры теряются из-за...

Жизнь за границей: как изменились судьбы 7 уехавших телеведущих

541

Два года назад отечественное телевидение столкнулось с беспрецедентной кадровой тектоникой — целая группа ярких и узнаваемых ведущих стремительно исчезла с экранов федеральных каналов. Эти лица долгие...

Кира Найтли, Деми Мур и другие

165

Кира Найтли на страницах журнала к выходу фильма «Пиджак», 2005. Следы динозавра, раскопанные в русле реки Палакси. Техас. США. 1952г. Самая большая женщина рядом с самым маленьким мужчиной, 1922 год....