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61 " In passion, I can fling out violent words, but they don’t yet answer to my actual feeling. It will be long enough yet before I think contemptuously of you. You know that when a light is suddenly extinguished, the image of it still shows before your eyes. But at last comes the darkness. "
― George Gissing , New Grub Street
62 " They belonged to that very small class of persons who still read, who have mind and leisure to find companionship in books. "
― George Gissing , The Crown of Life
63 " Her womanhood went eagerly to meet him. "
64 " She cared nothing now for lake and mountain; human companionship was her supreme need. "
― George Gissing
65 " The unhoped was all but granted her. She could labour on in the valley of the shadow of books, for a ray of dazzling sunshine might at any moment strike into its musty gloom. "
66 " It was always in your power to rule me. What pained me worst, and hardened me against you, was that I saw you didn’t care to exert your influence. There was never a time when I could have resisted a word of yours spoken out of your love for me. But even then, I am afraid, you no longer loved me, and now —— "
67 " [A] sensitive man who no longer finds himself on equal terms with his natural associates, shrinks into loneliness, and learns with some surprise how very willing people are to forget his existence. London is a wilderness abounding in anchorites -- voluntary or constrained. "
68 " A novel with undoubted weaknesses, it is nevertheless a considerable achievement for a 22 year "
― George Gissing , Complete Works of George Gissing (Illustrated)
69 " different—swift, virile "
― George Gissing , The Odd Women
70 " Think of the very words “novel,” “romance” — what do they mean but exaggeration of one bit of life? "
71 " Let beauty perish if it cannot ally itself with mind. "
72 " Mr Biffen,’ wrote another, ‘seems not to understand that a work of art must before everything else afford amusement. "
73 " Do you know anything about Arromanches? A very quiet little spot on the Normandy coast. You get to it by an hour's coach from Bayeux. Not infested by English. "
74 " The best moments of life are those when we contemplate beauty in the purely artistic spirit — objectively. I "
75 " La vita è come la prendi: tutta malinconica, o moderatamente luminosa. "
76 " Walker's a fool and Quarmby's an ass,' remarked her father. "
77 " exchanged looks, and laughed together. "
78 " I maintain that we people of brains are justified in supplying the mob with the food it likes. We "
79 " We have bidden the world go round for our amusement; henceforth it is our occupation to observe and discuss and make merry. "
80 " A few days ago her startled eye had caught an advertisement in the newspaper, headed 'Literary Machine'; had it then been invented at last, some automaton to supply the place of such poor creatures as herself to turn out books and articles? Alas! the machine was only one for holding volumes conveniently, that the work of literary manufacture might be physically lightened. But surely before long some Edison would make the true automaton; the problem must be comparatively such a simple one. Only to throw in a given number of old books, and have them reduced, blended, modernised into a single one for to-day's consumption. "