This is the spring edition of a Grex game that has been running for many
 seasons now.
 
 It works like this: Whoever is "up" posts a published quote. The object
 is to guess the author. The first person to guess correctly gets to give
 the next quote.
 
 If you're up and people are having trouble, it's considered good form to
 give hints and/or another quote by the same author.
 
 If you're guessing, please guess one author at a time (that is, no
 scattergun guessing by one person). If you're told that your guess is
 wrong, then you're free to guess a different author.
 
 Your quotes can be easy or hard, but the authors should be people that
 at least some Grexers are apt to have heard of.

[thanks to remmers for the above text]

278 responses total.

   when we left winter agora, it was my turn.  here's my quotation:

   i can remember the two of us the next day eating lunch while sitting
on the low white wall along the boundary of romanee conti -- cold
chicken, french bread, a fromage dur and a bottle of romanee conti
itself.  we spread our food on the top of the wall and stood the bottle
alongside, together with two good wineglasses.  my father drew the cork
and poured the wine while i did my best to carve the chicken, and there
we sat in the warm autumn sun, watching the grape-pickers combing the
rows of vines, filling their baskets, bringing them to the heads of
the rows, dumping the grapes into larger baskets which in turn were
emptied into carts drawn by pale creamy-brown horses.  i can remember
my father sitting on the wall and waving a half-eaten drumstick in the
direction of this splendid scene and saying, "you are sitting, my boy,
on the edge of the most famous piece of land in the whole world!  just
look at it!  four and a half acres of flinty red clay!  that's all it
is!  but those grapes you can see them picking at this very moment will
produce a wine that is a glory among among wines.  it is also almost
unobtainable because so little of it is made.  this bottle we are
drinking now came from here eleven years ago.  smell it!  inhale the
bouquet!  taste it!  drink it!  but never try to describe it!  it is
impossible to put such a flavour into words!  to drink a romanee conti
is like having an orgasm in the mouth and the nose both at the same
time."

   i loved it when my father got himself worked up like this. 
listening to him during those early years, i began to realize how
important it was to be an enthusiast in life.  he taught me that if
you are interested in something, no matter what it is, go at it full
speed ahead.  embrace it with both arms, hug it, love it, and above
all become passionate about it.  lukewarm is no good.  hot is no good,
either.  white hot and passionate is the only thing to be.

(I can't wait to see who wrote this).

John Steinbeck?  Probably too positive for him, but it doesn't sound 
like Bradbury.

Spring 1999 agora item 20, the "mysterious quote item", has been linked
to books 83. 

Thanks, Rane.
I have no idea on this one.

   neither steinbeck nor bradbury.  the author is a dead european male.

frustratingly vaguely familiar...

   here's another quotation taken from the same work as the one in
resp:1:

   then suddenly, in the absolute stillness that prevailed, y-----'s
small sweet voice began to sing 'un bel di vedremo'.  the effect was
stunning.  in that place, in that atmosphere, in the dark night beside
the lake outside p------'s window, i was moved beyond words.  i saw
the composer freeze.  the pen was in his hand against the paper and
the hand froze and his whole body became motionless as he sat listening
to the voice outside the window.  he didn't look round.  i don't think
he dared to look round for fear of breaking the spell.  outside his
window a young maiden was singing one of his favorite arias in a small
clear voice in absolutely perfect pitch.  his face didn't change
expression.  his mouth didn't move.  nothing about him moved while the
aria was in progress.  it was a magic moment.  then y----- stopped
singing.  for a few seconds longer p------ remained sitting at the
piano.  he seemed to be waiting for more, for a sign of some sort from
outside.  but y----- didn't move or speak either.  she simply stood
there with her face upturned to the window, waiting for the man to come
to her.

   and come to her he did.  i saw him put down his pen and rise slowly
from the piano stool.  he walked to the window.  then he saw y-----.
i have spoken many times of her scintillating beauty, and the sight of
her standing out there so still and serene must have come as a glorious
shock to p------.  he stared.  he gaped.  was this a dream?  then
y----- smiled at him and that broke the spell.  i saw him come
suddenly out of his trance and i heard him say, "dio mio come bello!"
then he jumped clear out of the window and clasped y----- in a powerful
embrace.

   here are some more hints: this author was married to an american
actress, and was also more well-known for his children's books than
for the books geared more toward adults.

My guess is C S Lewis.  If this is right, i'll come up with something
better than Heinlein as a quote :)

The clue describes Roald Dahl.

Damn, just missed it. I think you're right MD. It seemed very familiar.

If that's who it is, then you can enter the next quote,
cyklone.  I didn't guess the quote, just the clue.

Well, I'm fresh out of quotes today (and we haven't gotten confirmation that
we're right), so I think I'll wait a bit . . . . .

   roald dahl is right.  the quotations were from _my uncle oswald_.
i'll let cyklone and md decide between themselves who is next.

quit
quit at the start of a line
?

"Fiery the angels fell.  Deep thunder rolled along lee shores."
"Burning with the fires of Ork."

d00d...is that a zepplin t00n?

Heh, yeah.

None the less, we're waiting for either cycyklone or md ...

I'll defer to anyone who wants to enter a quote (or to md).

Oops, sorry.  Here's one:

"She says this park would make a tidy summer resort, if
there was any custom for it.  Summer resort -- another
invention of hers -- just words, without any meaning.
What is a summer resort?  But it is best not to ask her,
she has such a rage for explaining."

Here's another one, same author of course:

"The naming goes recklessly on, in spite of anything 
I can do.  I had a very good name for the estate, and
it was musical and pretty -- Garden-of-Eden.  Privately,
I continue to call it that, but not any longer publicly.
The new creature says it is all woods and rocks and
scenery, and therefor has no resemblance to a garden.
She says it *looks* like a park, and does not look like
anything *but* a park.  Consequently, without consulting
me, it has been new-named -- Niagara Falls Park.  This
is sufficiently highhanded, it seems to me.  And already
there is a sign up:

                       KEEP OFF
                      THE GRASS

My life is not as happy as it was."

Twain.

Got 'im!  Johnnie's up.

 Damn. I love that story. "The Diary of Adam and Eve".

  I especially like the last line. "Wherever she was, there was Eden."

Okay, here we go...


The young dandy was so much absorbed in his anxious quest that he did
not observe his own success; he did not hear, he did not see the
ironical exclamations of admiration, the genuine appreciation, the
biting gibes, the soft invitations of some of the masks. Though he was
so handsome as to rank among those exceptional persons who come to an
opera ball in search of an adventure, and who expect it as confidently
as men looked for a lucky coup at roulette in Frascati's day, he
seemed quite philosophically sure of his evening; he must be the hero
of one of those mysteries with three actors which constitute an opera
ball, and are known only to those who play a part in them; for, to
young wives who come merely to say, "I have seen it," to country
people, to inexperienced youths, and to foreigners, the opera house
must on those nights be the palace of fatigue and dulness. To these,
that black swarm, slow and serried--coming, going, winding, turning,
returning, mounting, descending, comparable only to ants on a pile of
wood--is no more intelligible than the Bourse to a Breton peasant who
has never heard of the Grand livre.

With a few rare exceptions, men wear no masks in Paris; a man in a
domino is thought ridiculous. In this the spirit of the nation betrays
itself. Men who want to hide their good fortune can enjoy the opera
ball without going there; and masks who are absolutely compelled to go
in come out again at once. One of the most amusing scenes is the crush
at the doors produced as soon as the dancing begins, by the rush of
persons getting away and struggling with those who are pushing in. So
the men who wear masks are either jealous husbands who come to watch
their wives, or husbands on the loose who do not wish to be watched by
them--two situations equally ridiculous.

Now, our young man was followed, though he knew it not, by a man in a
mask, dogging his steps, short and stout, with a rolling gait, like a
barrel. To every one familiar with the opera this disguise betrayed a
stock-broker, a banker, a lawyer, some citizen soul suspicious of
infidelity. For in fact, in really high society, no one courts such
humiliating proofs. Several masks had laughed as they pointed this
preposterous figure out to each other; some had spoken to him, a few
young men had made game of him, but his stolid manner showed entire
contempt for these aimless shafts; he went on whither the young man
led him, as a hunted wild boar goes on and pays no heed to the bullets
whistling about his ears, or the dogs barking at his heels.

thomas pynchon?

'fraid not...

seems to be a dearth of guessing.  let's try another quote from
the same work...


At this moment journalists, dandies, and idlers were all examining the
charming subject of their bet as horse-dealers examine a horse for
sale. These connoisseurs, grown old in familiarity with every form of
Parisian depravity, all men of superior talent each his own way,
equally corrupt, equally corrupting, all given over to unbridled
ambition, accustomed to assume and to guess everything, had their eyes
centered on a masked woman, a woman whom no one else could identify.
They, and certain habitual frequenters of the opera balls, could alone
recognize under the long shroud of the black domino, the hood and
falling ruff which make the wearer unrecognizable, the rounded form,
the individuality of figure and gait, the sway of the waist, the
carriage of the head--the most intangible trifles to ordinary eyes,
but to them the easiest to discern.

In spite of this shapeless wrapper they could watch the most appealing
of dramas, that of a woman inspired by a genuine passion. Were she La
Torpille, the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, or Madame de Serizy, on the
lowest or highest rung of the social ladder, this woman was an
exquisite creature, a flash from happy dreams. These old young men,
like these young old men, felt so keen an emotion, that they envied
Lucien the splendid privilege of working such a metamorphosis of a
woman into a goddess. The mask was there as though she had been alone
with Lucien; for that woman the thousand other persons did not exist,
nor the evil and dust-laden atmosphere; no, she moved under the
celestial vault of love, as Raphael's Madonnas under their slender
oval glory. She did not feel herself elbowed; the fire of her glance
shot from the holes in her mask and sank into Lucien's eyes; the
thrill of her frame seemed to answer to every movement of her
companion. Whence comes this flame that radiates from a woman in love
and distinguishes her above all others? Whence that sylph-like
lightness which seems to negative the laws of gravitation? Is the soul
become ambient? Has happiness a physical effluence?

The ingenuousness of a girl, the graces of a child were discernible
under the domino. Though they walked apart, these two beings suggested
the figures of Flora and Zephyr as we see them grouped by the
cleverest sculptors; but they were beyond sculpture, the greatest of
the arts; Lucien and his pretty domino were more like the angels
busied with flowers or birds, which Gian Bellini has placed beneath
the effigies of the Virgin Mother. Lucien and this girl belonged to
the realm of fancy, which is as far above art as cause is above
effect.

Could we have a hint or two about the author?

Balzac.

(Balzac would have been my guess too. Perhaps it's even right...)

Balzac is, indeed, correct.  From "Scenes From a Courtesan's Life".

I defer to remmers, who had guessed Balzac but got
here too late, and who enters far more interesting
mystery quotes than I.

Balzac's a real author?  Wow.  I just remember the line from "Music 
Man."

Yep, Balzac is for real. Generally regarded as one of the great 19th 
century novelists.

Hm, I should find a quote. I'll try to do that by tomorrow.

This quote is from a living American writer:

             The study -- sold as a prefabricated toolshed -- is
        eight feet by ten feet. Like a plane's cockpit, it is
        crammed with high-tech equipment. There is no quill pen
        in sight. There is a computer, a printer, and a photo-
        copying machine. My backless chair, a prie-dieu on which
        I kneel, slides under the desk; I give it a little kick
        when I leave. There is an air conditioner, a heater, and
        an electric kettle. There is a low-tech bookshelf, a
        shelf of gull and whale bones, and a bed. Under the bed
        I stow paints -- a one-pint can of yellow to touch up
        the window's trim, and five or six tubes of artists'
        oils. The study affords ample room for one. One who is
        supposed to be writing books. You can read in the space
        of a coffin, and you can write in the space of a tool-
        shed meant for mowers and spades.

The Unabomber?

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss