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Grex > Books > #79: The Mysterious Quote - Winter 1999 Edition | |
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| 25 new of 195 responses total. |
remmers
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response 150 of 195:
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Mar 8 21:14 UTC 1999 |
A real antique, to judge by the style. Laurence Sterne, maybe?
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mooncat
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response 151 of 195:
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Mar 8 21:58 UTC 1999 |
Jane Austen? (I'm thinking... Persuasion...)
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bookworm
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response 152 of 195:
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Mar 8 22:46 UTC 1999 |
Sounds like I've got a little reading to do.
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sekari
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response 153 of 195:
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Mar 9 01:08 UTC 1999 |
I think I already guessed jane austin, (with persuasion in mind) or was that
another guess?
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sekari
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response 154 of 195:
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Mar 9 01:10 UTC 1999 |
no, i guess I didn't, must hae been a few quotes back.
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aruba
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response 155 of 195:
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Mar 9 04:47 UTC 1999 |
Indeed, it is Jane Austen, from the original ending to Persuasion. (I gather
it was published after she died, from her notes, which explains why it
contains abbreviations and odd capitalization.) The first quote was from
"Love and Freindship" [sic], part of the "Juvenalia". Anne's up!
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mooncat
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response 156 of 195:
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Mar 9 14:33 UTC 1999 |
Ack... I was actually right.. Umm... Okay, I'll try to find something
suitable by this evening.
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mooncat
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response 157 of 195:
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Mar 10 01:20 UTC 1999 |
Okay here we go... It's fairly long, and if there are spelling
mistakes assume they are mine... and forgive the temporarily-one-
handed-typist....
"Cats. It sounded quite alluring to V., in the plural. She
pictured an island in Muskoka haunted by pussies.
"That alone shoes there is something wrong with him," decreed
Aunt Isabel.
"People who don't like cats," said V., attacking her dessert
with a relish, "always seem to think that there is some peculiar
virtue in not liking them."
"The man hasn't a friend except Roaring Abel," said Uncle
Wellington, "And if Roaring Abel had kept away from him, as everybody
else did, it would have been better for - for some members of his family."
Uncle Wellington's rather lame conclusion was due to a marital
glance from Aunt Wellington reminding him of what he had almost forgotten-
that there were girls at the table.
"If you mean," said V. passionately, "that Barney S. is the father
of Cecily Gay's child, he isn't. It's a wicked lie."
In spite of her indignation V. was hugely amused at the expression
of the faces around that festal table. She had not seen anything like
it since the day, seventeen years ago, when at Cousin Gladys's thimble
party, they discoveredOP that she had got - SOMETHING - in her head at
school. Lice in her head! V. was done with euphemisms.
Poor Mrs. F. was almost in a state of collapse. She had believed-
or pretended to believe- that V. still supposed that children were
found in parsley beds.
"Hush- hush!" implored Cousin Stickles.
"I don't mean to hush," said V. perversely, "I've hush-hushed
all my life. I'll scream if I want to. Don't make me want to. And
stop talking about Barney S."
V. didn'tr exactly understand her own indignation. What did
BArney S.'s imputed crimes and misdemeanours matter to her? And why,
out of them all, did it seem most intolerable that he should have been
poor, pitiful little Cecily Gay's false lover? For it did seem intolerable
to her. She did not mind when they called him a theif and a counterfeiter
and a jail-bird; but she could not endure to think that he had loved and
ruined Cecily Gay. She recalled his face on the two occasions of their chance
meetings-his twisted, enigmatic, engaging smile, his twinkle, his thin
sensitive, almost ascetic lips, his general air of frank daredeviltry.
A man wish such a smile and lips might have murdered or stolen but he
could not have betrayed. She suddenly hated every one who said it or
believed it of him.
"When I was a young girl I never thought or spoke about such
matters, Doss," said Aunt Wellington, crushingly.
"But I'm not a young girl," retorted V., uncrushed. "Aren't
you always rubbing that into me? And you are all evil-minded, senseless
gossips. Can't you leave poor Cissy Gay alone? She's dying. Whatever
she did, God or the Devil has punished her enough for it. You needn't
take a hand, too. As for Barney S., the only crime he has been guilty
of is living to himself and minding his own business. He can, it seems,
get along without you. Which is an unpardonable sin, of course, in your
little snobocracy." V. coined that concluding word suddenly and felt that
it was an inspiration. That was exactly what they were and not one of
them was fit to mend another.
"V., your poor father would turn over in his grave if he could
hear you," said Mrs. F.
"I dare say he would enjoy that for a change," said V. brazenly."
There you go, have at it.
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flem
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response 158 of 195:
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Mar 10 19:02 UTC 1999 |
Danielle Steele? <g>
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mooncat
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response 159 of 195:
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Mar 10 19:31 UTC 1999 |
<grins> umm... no... But Female...
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mooncat
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response 160 of 195:
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Mar 13 22:08 UTC 1999 |
Okay, no quesses for a few days... I'll post another quote, but
from a different book sometime today... In the mean time, some
hints... The author is female, and from North America.
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sjones
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response 161 of 195:
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Mar 14 06:39 UTC 1999 |
margaret atwood? if you're speaking continentally...:)
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mooncat
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response 162 of 195:
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Mar 14 20:58 UTC 1999 |
Nope, not Margaret Atwood. This author also happens to be dead.
Next quote- new book, same author (of course)
"Emily, with an eloquent glance at Ellen's hands, went and got the dish
towel.
"Your hands are fat and pudgy," she said. "The bones don't show at
all."
"Never mind sassing back! It's awful, with your poor pa dead in there.
But if you Aunt Ruth takes you she'll soon cure you of that."
"Is Aunt Ruth going to take me?"
"I don't know, but she ought to. She's a widow with no chick or child,
and well-to-do."
"I don't think I want Aunt Ruth to take me," said Emily deliberately,
after a moment's reflection.
"Well, you won't have the choosing likely. You ought to be thankful
to get a home anywhere. Remember you're not of much importance."
"I am important to myself," cried Emily proudly.
"It'll be some chore to bring you up," muttered Ellen. "Your Aunt Ruth
is the one to do it, in my opinion. She won't stand no nonsense. A fine
woman she is and the neatest housekeeper on P. E. Island. You could eat off
her floor."
"I don't want to eat off her floor. I don't care if a floor is dirty
as long as the tablecloth is clean."
"Well, her tablecloths are clean too, I reckon. She's got an elegant
house in S. with bow windows and wooden lace all round the roof. It's very
stylish. It would be a fine home for you. She'd learn you some sense and
do you a world of good."
"I don't want to learn sense and be done a world of good to," cried
Emily with a quivering lip. "I-I want somebody to love me."
"Well, you've got to behave yourself if you want people to like you.
You're not to blame so much- your pa has spoiled you. I told him so often
enough, but he just laughed. I hope he ain't sorry for it now. The fact is,
Emily Starr, you're queer, and folks don't care for queer children."
"How am I queer?" demanded Emily.
"You talk queer- and you act queer- and at times you look queer. And
you're too old for your age- though that ain't your fault. It comes of never
mixing with other children. I've always threaped at your father to send you
to school- learning at home ain't the same thing- but he wouldn't listen to
me, of course. I don't say but what you are as far along in book learning
as you need to be, but what you want is to learn how to be like other
children. In one way it would be a good thing if your Uncle Oliver would take
you, for he's got a big family. But he's not as well off as the rest, so it
ain't likely he will. Your Uncle Wallace might, seeing as he reckons himself
the head of the family. He's only got a grown-up daughter. But his wife's
delicate- or fancies she is."
"I wish Aunt Laura would take me," said Emily. She remembered that
father had said Aunt Laura was something like her mother.
"Aunt Laura! She won't have no say in it- Elizabeth's boss at New
Moon. Jimmy Murray runs the farm, but he ain't quite all there, I'm told_"
"What part of him isn't there?" asked Emily curiously.
"Laws, it's something about hi mind, child. He's a bit simple- some
accident or other when he was a youngster, I've heard. IT addled his head,
kind of. Elizabeth was mixed up in it some way- I've never heard the rights
of it. I don't reckon the New Moon people will want to be bothered with you.
They're awful set in their ways. You take my advice and try to please your
Aunt Ruth. Be polite- and well-behaved- mebbe she'll take a fancy to you.
There, that's all the dishes. You'd better go upstairs and be out of the
way." "
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gjharb
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response 163 of 195:
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Mar 14 22:54 UTC 1999 |
L.M. Montgomery - Emily of New Moon.
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mooncat
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response 164 of 195:
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Mar 15 14:28 UTC 1999 |
Yup. :) The first was "Blue Castle" one of Lucy Maud's later books,
and a lot of fun. :)
Gloria's up.
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gjharb
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response 165 of 195:
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Mar 15 14:45 UTC 1999 |
Okay - give me a day or two to post.
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gjharb
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response 166 of 195:
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Mar 16 20:00 UTC 1999 |
Ok. Hints about the author: Male, American, still living.
"D_____ began to read hungrily. as though starved for print. And the speed
next -- and why. Everybody else is a robot, a machine.
"Some persons seem to like you, and others seem to hate you, and you must
wonder why. They are simply liking machines and hating machines.
"You are pooped and demoralized," read D_____. "Why wouldn't you be?
Of course it is exhausting, having to reason all the time in a universe which
wasn't meant to be reasonable."
"D_____H_____ read on: "You are surrounded by loving machines, hating
machines, greedy machines, unselfish machines, brave machines, cowardly
machines, truthful machines, lying machines, funny machines, solemn
machines," he read. "Their only purpose is to stir you up in every reasonable
way, so the Creator of the Universe can watch your reactions. They can no
more feel or reason than grandfather clocks.
"The Creator of the Universe would now like to apologize not only for
the capricious, jostling companionship he provided during the test, but for
the trashy, stinking condition of the planet itself. The Creator programmed
the robots to abuse it for millions of years, so it would be a poisonous,
festering cheese when you got here. Also, he made sure it would be
desperately crowded by programming the robots, regardless of their living
conditions, to crave sexual intercourse and adore infants more than almost
anything."
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gjharb
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response 167 of 195:
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Mar 16 20:07 UTC 1999 |
First two paragraphs got screwed up:
"D_____ now began to read hungrily, as though starved for print. And
the speed-reading course he had taken at the YMCA allowed him to make a
perfect pig of himself with pages and words.
"Dear Sir, poor sir, brave sir:" he read, "You are an experiment by the
Creator of the Universe. You are the only creature in the entire Universe
who has free will. You are the only one who has to figure out what to do next
-- and why. Everybody else is a robot, a machine.
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jep
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response 168 of 195:
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Mar 16 20:10 UTC 1999 |
Brian Aldiss?
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gjharb
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response 169 of 195:
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Mar 16 20:31 UTC 1999 |
Nope.
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flem
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response 170 of 195:
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Mar 16 22:26 UTC 1999 |
Stanislaw Lem?
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gjharb
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response 171 of 195:
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Mar 17 03:02 UTC 1999 |
Not Lem.
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sekari
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response 172 of 195:
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Mar 17 07:27 UTC 1999 |
douglass adams?
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cyklone
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response 173 of 195:
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Mar 17 12:46 UTC 1999 |
Kurt Vonegut?
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gjharb
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response 174 of 195:
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Mar 17 19:26 UTC 1999 |
Kurt Vonnegut it is. That quote was taken from Breakfast of Champions.
Cyklone - you are up.
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