This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
J. B. S. Haldane, fully John Burdon Sanderson Haldane
In the development and the maintenance of a living organism the coordination is very clear. The development of each part can be shown to be dependent on that of other parts, including the immediate environment; and the more closely development and maintenance are studied the more evident does this become. But the particular manner in which the parts and the environment influence one another is such that the specific structure and activities of the organism are maintained. They are unmistakably developed and maintained as a whole, and this is what we mean when we say that the organism lives a specific life. The conception of its life enables us to predict the general behavior of its parts so long as it is alive, and in particular it enables us to predict the general manner of its reproduction from a rudimentary part of the same organism? it is this co-ordinated maintenance that we call life.
J. B. Priestly, fully John Boynton Priestly
In plain words; now that Britain has told the world she has the H-Bomb, she should announce as early as possible that she has done with it, that she proposes to reject, in all circumstances, nuclear warfare. This is not pacifism. There is no suggestion here of abandoning the immediate defence of this island...No, what should be abandoned is the idea of deterrence-by-threat-of-retaliation. There is no real security in it, no decency in it, no faith, hope, nor charity in it.
Earth | Experience | Need | Revolution | Sacred | Will | Value |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
Every writer making a secondary world wishes in some measure to be a real maker, or hopes that he is drawing on reality: hopes that the peculiar quality of this secondary world (if not all the details) are derived from Reality, or are flowing into it.
Man |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
Any corner of that county (however fair or squalid) is in an indefinable way 'home' to me, as no other part of the world is. There was a willow hanging over the mill-pool and I learned to climb it. It belonged to a butcher on the Stratford Road, I think. One day they cut it down. They didn't do anything with it: the log just lay there. I never forgot that.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
Already he was a very different hobbit from the one that had run out without a pocket-handkerchief from Bag-End long ago. He had not had a pocket-handkerchief for ages.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
Don't ever laugh at live Dragons, Bilbo you fool!
Change | Reason | Relationship |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
All have their worth and each contributes to the worth of the others.
Nature | Technology | Time |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
And in the darkness bind them.
Conversation | Man | Ugly | Will |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
And when [B‰or] lay dead, of no wound or grief, but stricken by age, the Eldar saw for the first time the swift waning of the life of Men, and the death of weariness which they knew not in themselves; and they grieved greatly for the loss of their friends. But B‰or at the last had relinquished his life willingly and passed in peace; and the Eldar wondered much at the strange fate of Men, for in all their lore there was no account of it, and its end was hidden from them.
J. B. Priestly, fully John Boynton Priestly
Our trouble is that we drink too much tea. I see in this the slow revenge of the Orient, which has diverted the Yellow River down our throats.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
But fear no more! I would not take this thing, if it lay by the highway. Not were Minas Tirith falling in ruin and I alone could save her, so, using the weapon of the Dark Lord for her good and my glory. No, I do not wish for such triumphs, Frodo son of Drogo.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
If you mean you think it is my job to go into the secret passage first, O Thorin Thrain?s son Oakenshield, may your beard grow ever longer, he said crossly, say so at once and have done!
Man |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
I wonder if people will ever say, Let's hear about Frodo and the Ring. And they'll say, Yes, that's one of my favorite stories. Frodo was really courageous, wasn't he, Dad? Yes, m'boy, the most famousest of hobbits. And that's saying a lot.
Man |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
He was tall as a young tree, lithe, immensely strong, able swiftly to draw a great war-bow and shoot down a Nazg–l, endowed with the tremendous vitality of Elvish bodies, so hard and resistant to hurt that he went only in light shoes over rock or through snow, the most tireless of all the Fellowship.
Mind | Organization | Think |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
In those days of our tale, there were still some people who had both elves and heroes of the North for ancestors and Elrond, the master of the house, was their chief. He was as noble and as fair in face as an elf lord, as strong as a warrior, as wise as a wizard, as venerable as a king of dwarves and as kind as summer.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
I?ll bet I?m the first person to compare Bill Johnson to an old elf!
Man |
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
I would rather share one lifetime with you than face all the Ages of this world alone.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
If I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people. My great-great-grandfather came to England in the eighteenth century from Germany: the main part of my descent is therefore purely English, and I am an English subject?which should be sufficient. I have been accustomed, nonetheless, to regard my German name with pride, and continued to do so throughout the period of the late regrettable war, in which I served in the English army. I cannot, however, forbear to comment that if impertinent and irrelevant inquiries of this sort are to become the rule in matters of literature, then the time is not far distant when a German name will no longer be a source of pride.
J. R. R. Tolkien, fully John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
If you want to know what cram is, I can only say that I don?t know the recipe; but it is biscuitish, keeps good indefinitely, is supposed to be sustaining, and is certainly not entertaining, being in fact very uninteresting except as a chewing exercise.
Man |