In literary history, generation follows generation in a rage. Annie Dillard More Quotes by Annie Dillard More Quotes From Annie Dillard Your freedom as a writer is not freedom of expression in the sense of wild blurting; you may not let rip. It is life at its most free, if you are fortunate enough to be able to try it, because you select your materials, invent your task, and pace yourself. Annie Dillard rip expression trying Possibly everyone now dead considered his own death as a freak accident, a mistake. Some bad luck caused it. Every enterprising man jack of them, and every sunlit vigorous woman and child, too, who had seemed so alive and pleased, was cold as a meat hook, and new chattering people trampled their bones unregarding, and rubbed their hands together and got to work improving their prospects till their own feet slipped and they went under themselves ... Every place was a tilting edge. Annie Dillard mistake men children What is a house but a bigger skin, and a neighborhood map but the world's skin ever expanding? Annie Dillard skins house world Nature is, above all, profligate. Don't believe them when they tell you how economical and thrifty nature is, whose leaves return to the soil. Wouldn't it be cheaper to leave them on the tree in the first place? This deciduous business alone is a radical scheme, the brainchild of a deranged manic-depressive with limitless capital. Extravagance! Nature will try anything once. Annie Dillard autumn nature believe I know only enough of God to want to worship him, by any means ready to hand. Annie Dillard want mean hands Nature's silence is its one remark, and every flake of world is a chip off that old mute and immutable block. Annie Dillard block silence world A schedule defends from chaos and whim. A net for catching days. Annie Dillard catching chaos schedules Every spring he vowed to quit teaching school, and every summer he missed his pupils and searched for them on the streets. Annie Dillard teaching summer spring I can't dance anymore. Total knee replacements. I can't do anything anymore. Annie Dillard knees dance inspirational People who read are not too lazy to turn on the television; they prefer books. Annie Dillard lazy book people The Pulitzer is more useful than meaningful. Annie Dillard meaningful Theirs is the mystery of continuous creation and all that providence implies: the uncertainty of vision, the horror of the fixed, the dissolution of the present, the intricacy of beauty, the pressure of fecundity, the elusiveness of the free, and the flawed nature of perfection. Annie Dillard vision perfection pressure It could be that our faithlessness is a cowering cowardice born of our very smallness, a massive failure of imagination... If we were to judge nature by common sense or likelihood, we wouldnt believe the world existed. Annie Dillard imagination judging believe Trees have a curious relationship to the subject of the present moment. There are many created things in the universe that outlive us, that outlive the sun, even, but I can't think about them. I live with trees. Annie Dillard sun tree thinking A shepherd on a hilltop who looks at a mess of stars and thinks, ‘There’s a hunter, a plow, a fish,’ is making mental connections that have as much real force in the universe as the very fires in those stars themselves. Annie Dillard stars real thinking To crank myself up I stood on a jack and ran myself up. I tightened myself like a bolt. I inserted myself in a vise-clamp and wound the handle till the pressure built. I drank coffee in titrated doses. It was a tricky business, requiring the finely tuned judgment of a skilled anesthesiologist. There was a tiny range within which coffee was effective, short of which it was useless, and beyond which, fatal. Annie Dillard tiny coffee useless Having chosen this foolishness, I was a free being. How could the world ever stop me, how could I betray myself, if I was not afraid? Annie Dillard betray not-afraid world Are you living just a little and calling that life? Annie Dillard simple calling littles It's a little silly to finally learn how to write at this age. But I long ago realized I was secretly sincere. Annie Dillard long-ago silly writing What could you say to a dying person that would not enrage by its triviality? Annie Dillard triviality dying persons
