Melissa Holbrook Pierson quotes

“There has never been a book like this. At once a poetics of place, a work of deep history, a bildungsroman, and an acute inquiry into the big subjects: love, family, other animals, the nature of creativity. It is sublime. It's also very funny. Haunting and haunted, Hold Still is the memoir of an artist that is art itself.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Art Quotes #Book Quotes #Creativity Quotes

“I don't think of myself as fitting into a category. But I had to be careful in all of my books not to repeat things, because I have these ideas, and though the subjects were disparate, the same idea would come up through different portals.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Book Quotes #Thinking Quotes #Ideas Quotes

“We're physical objects, we think of ourselves as these kind of free-floating brains, but the brain is such a little part. It's way smaller than we like to think. We think we're these important human beings. We're not animals or anything. But what did we come out of? What are we made out of? We're made of the same stuff as out there.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Animal Quotes #Thinking Quotes #Brain Quotes

“If we didn't love things, then we couldn't feel their loss. The flip side of loving is losing. I mean, you can't experience one without the other.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Mean Quotes #Loss Quotes #Flip Quotes

“I'm not necessarily a happy person. I don't think that happiness is always the right response to a situation. I think we've come to a point in time where people are saying, "Oh, you know, loss and change, that's just normal."”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Loss Quotes #Thinking Quotes #People Quotes

“I feel like human beings can't help but destroy, but if our numbers are small we don't destroy as much as we do when our numbers are this huge and out of control. I wonder, what's the carrying capacity for human beings? When do we get to the point when we can't take it anymore, when it becomes too unpleasant to us just to be here because there's too many of us and there's no solitude anymore.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Numbers Quotes #Solitude Quotes #Helping Quotes

“Why is nostalgia such a bad thing? Nostalgia is a longing to return. If you really loved where you came from, if, in essence, you really loved yourself, how can you not want that to exist? It's like wanting your parents keep living.”
-- Melissa Holbrook Pierson

#Essence Quotes #Parent Quotes #Want Quotes

“Poetry leads us to the unstructured sources of our beings, to the unknown, and returns us to our rational, structured selves refreshed. Having once experienced the mystery, plenitude, contradiction, and composure of a work of art, we afterward have a built-in resistance to the slogans and propaganda of oversimplification that have often contributed to the destruction of human life. Poetry is a verbal means to a nonverbal source. It is a motion to no-motion, to the still point of contemplation and deep realization.”

“To Lawren Harris art was almost a mission. He believed that a country which ignored the arts left no record of itself worth preserving.”

“I've always been a bit of a mix between art and technology. I used to paint a lot, but I'm not very good with my hands. It has always been a fusion between my computer gaming interests and being exposed to the rich data of society that we live in.”

“And malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man.”

“It comes back to the old question: How can the Bible be so wise in some places and so barbaric in others? And why should we put any faith in a book that includes such brutality?”

Source : A. J. Jacobs (2011). “A.J. Jacobs Omnibus: The Know-It-All, The Year of Living Biblically, My Life as an Experiment”, p.707, Simon and Schuster

“I always thought the name of Utah’s major newspaper was some sort of weird misspelling of the word “desert.” But no, Deseret is the “land of the honeybee,” according to the Book of Mormon. I guess I should have figured they would have caught a typo in the masthead after 154 years.”

Source : A. J. Jacobs (2004). “The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World”, p.56, Simon and Schuster

“My reading list grows exponentially. Every time I read a book, it'll mention three other books I feel I have to read. It's like a particularly relentless series of pop-up ads.”

Source : A. J. Jacobs (2008). “The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible”, p.29, Simon and Schuster

“No I or individual is better than the team. I've scored no goals just on my own. Every goal I've ever scored has been because of someone else on my team, their excellence, their bravery. And I'm kind of the end product of a collection of a really good vibe, and feeling, and creativity on the field.”

“Educationists should build the capacities of the spirit of inquiry, creativity, entrepreneurial and moral leadership among students and become their role model.”

“Made with Pencils is grounded in the creativity of a few, propelled by the financial support of many, and most importantly, it's empowering generations to come. A simple idea, a heartfelt desire, and a world of possibility. A pencil, a promise, and a dream.”