J M G Builders Quotes

A writer is not a prophet, is not a philosopher; he's just someone who is witness to what is around him. And so writing is a way to ... it's the best way to testify, to be a witness. ~ J M G Le Clezio

One day is enough to master reading in Korean. Hangeul is a very scientific and convenient alphabet system for communication. ~ J M G Le Clezio

The writer, the poet, the novelist, are all creators. This does not mean that they invent language; it means that they use language to create beauty, ideas, images. This is why we cannot do without them. ~ J M G Le Clezio

I don't have any office; I can write everywhere. So, I put a piece of paper on the table, and then I travel. Literally, writing for me is like travelling. It's getting out of myself and living another life - maybe a better life. ~ J M G Le Clezio

Looking at the sky, he suddenly saw that it had become black. Then white again, but with great rippling circles. The circles were vultures wheeling around the sun. The vultures disappeared, to be replaced by checkers squares ready to be played on. On the board, the pieces moved around incredibly rapidly, winning dozens of games every minute. They were scarcely lined up before they started rushing at each other again, banging into each other, forming fighting combinations, wiping the other side out in the wink of an eye. Then the squares scattered, giving way to the grille of a crossword puzzle, and here, too, words flashed, drove each other away, clustered, were erased. They were all very long words, like Catalepsy, Thunderbird, Superrequeteriquísímo and Anticonstitutionally. The grille faded away, and suddenly the whole sky was covered with linked words, long sentences full of semicolons and inverted commas. For the space of a few seconds, there was this gigantic sheet of paper on which were written sentences that moved forward jerkily, changing their meaning, modifying their construction, altering completely as they advanced. It was beautiful, so beautiful that nothing like that had ever been read anywhere, and yet it was impossible to decipher the writing. It was all about death, or pity, or the incredible secrets that are hidden somewhere, at one of the farthest points of time. It was about water, too, about vast lakes floating just above the mountains, lakes shimmering u ~ J M G Le Clezio

Language is the most extraordinary invention in the history of humanity, the one which came before everything and which makes it possible to share everything. ~ J M G Le Clezio

Words are taking their revenge. One day, they break the seals of the phylacteries, and come swarming out like snakes. Another day, they spurt from the labels of the bottles that had held them prisoner, and spread through the black sky with their pterodactyl-like jaws thrust forward like a saw-blade knife. They sweep straight ahead, and as they kill their masters their cries of vengeance can be heard. ~ J M G Le Clezio

Out there, in the open desert, men can walk for days without passing a single house, seeing a well, for the desert is so vast that no one can know it all. Men go out into the desert, and they are like ships at sea; no one knows when they will return. Sometimes there are storms, but nothing like here, terrible storms, and the wind tears up the sand and throws it high into the sky, and the men are lost. They die, drowned in the sand, they die lost like ships in a storm, and the sand retains their bodies. Everything is so different in that land; the sun isn't the same as it is here, it burns hotter, and there are men that come back blinded, their faces burned. Nights, the cold makes men who are lost scream out in pain, the cold breaks their bones. Even the men aren't the same as they are here...they are cruel, they stalk their pray like foxes, drawing silently near. They are black, like the Hartani, dressed in blue, faces veiled. They aren't men, but djinns, children of the devil, and they deal with the devil; they are like sorcerers... ~ J M G Le Clezio

When I was a child, I grew up speaking French, I mean, in a French public school. So my first contact with literature was in French, and that's the reason why I write in French. ~ J M G Le Clezio

To act: that is what the writer would like to be able to do, above all. To act, rather than to bear witness. To write, imagine, and dream in such a way that his words and inventions and dreams will have an impact upon reality, will change people's minds and hearts, will prepare the way for a better world. ~ J M G Le Clezio

O.M.G. Lucca, what are you feeding her? Everyday I look at you, and I swear those twinnes must double in size. Look at your bump in this dress, how are you managing to cart that around? Rather you than me chubby." ~Hazel ~ S.J. Molloy

I wanted to tell you this, too: consciousness is a bad thing. Consciousness is a dead thing. Free yourselves from consciousness! It is high time. All that is needed is to strip off this garment: nothing very difficult about that. Tear the skin from your body, for it is not a true skin, it is a cellophane tissue that blocks the pores, that asphyxiates. Peel the tissue off, peel it off. ~ J M G Le Clezio

I grew up in a Mauritian bubble in France ... I had the feeling of not belonging, but still living with French culture. ~ J M G Le Clezio

I have the feeling of being a very small item on this planet, and literature enables me to express that. ~ J M G Le Clezio

If I examine the circumstances which inspired me to write - and this is not mere self-indulgence, but a desire for accuracy - I see clearly that the starting point of it all for me was war. ~ J M G Le Clezio

Reading is a free practice. I think the readers are free to begin by the books where they want to. They don't have to be led in their reading. ~ J M G Le Clezio

The desert is so vast that no one can know it all. Men go out into the desert, and they are like ships at sea; no one knows when they will return. ~ J M G Le Clezio

To understand the hidden secret of the modern industrial world in which I find myself, I have to return to another world. That world is at once wartime Nice and the plantation - the sugar isles on which Europe's prosperity was built. ~ J M G Le Clezio

I can understand better than most the contradiction between the idealistic civilisation and religious morals of Europe and what they did with the slaves, because the root of the evil is only two generations away from me. Maybe this has fed my need to fight against the abuses of modern civilisation. ~ J M G Le Clezio

To become like the Father whose only authority is compassion, I have to shed countless tears and so prepare my heart to receive anyone, whatever their journey has been, and forgive them from that heart. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

They were going round and round the island, but they did not meet because all were going at the same rate. ~ J.M. Barrie

Peter invented, with Wendy's help, a new game that fascinated him enormously, until he suddenly had no more interest in it, which, as you have been told, was what always happened with his games. It consisted in pretending not to have adventures ... ~ J.M. Barrie

The monster is peeking through, peering at me from behind his mask. He wants to come out. He wants me to play with him. ~ J.M. Darhower

Are you done crying now?" he asks.
I laugh again. "You're such an asshole."
"I was going to talk to you," he says, "but you might blow snot on me with all that blubbering. ~ J.M. Darhower

Every "I hate you" that echoed from her chest was followed by an "I love you" from his lips. Every time she begged him to let go, he told her he would be there forever. ~ J.M. Darhower

People make mistakes. They do things sometimes that you don't like, that you wouldn't do. But that doesn't mean you should give up on them, that you should write them off. Because nobody is hopeless as long as they're still breathing. ~ J.M. Darhower

Tell me, Mr. DeMarco. What's love to you?"
[ ... ]
He glared at his teacher. "I think it's ridiculous you're even trying to define it like it's something material you can just go find if you want it. People use the word too loosely as it is. They say they love this and they love that, when they don't. They just like the shi - uh, stuff. Love is something that changes you, and if you really loved all the crap you say you love, you'd never know who you were because you'd constantly be changing. Once you love, you love forever. You can't help it. ~ J.M. Darhower

Let me tell you the meaning of the sacred and alluring garden that blooms in the heart of the desert and produces the food of life. The garden for which you are currently heading is nowhere and everywhere except in the camps. It is another name for the only place where you belong, Michaels, where you do not feel homeless. It is off every map, no road leads to it that is merely a road, and only you know the way. ~ J.M. Coetzee

If you knew how great is a mother's love, you would have no fear. ~ J.M. Barrie

Was it serious? I don't know. It certainly had serious consequences. ~ J.M. Coetzee

And I love you because you're the only one that sees me, not the scars or the h-history, just me. ~ J.M. Madden

You are the heir to the Kingdom. Prosperity is your birth right and you hold the key to more abundance in every area of your life then you can possibly imagine. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

I strongly encourage you to find a place to think and to discipline yourself to pause and use it, because it has the potential to change your life. It can help you to figure out what's really important and what isn't. As writer and Catholic priest Henri J. M. Nouwen observed, When you are able to create a lonely place in the middle of your actions and concerns, your successes and failures slowly can lose some of their power over you. ~ John C. Maxwell

There were odd stories about him; as that when children died he went part of the way with them, so that they should not be frightened. She ~ J.M. Barrie

Let's dare to enter into an intimate relationship with God without fear, trusting that we will receive love and always more love. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

POLICEMAN. Good luck. (She finds it easiest just to nod in reply) I wish I was a Prince. ~ J.M. Barrie

It may have been quixotic, but it was magnificent. ~ J.M. Barrie

Shall we make a new rule of life from tonight: always try to be a little kinder than is necessary? ~ J.M. Barrie

In becoming a citizen, one undertakes certain duties and responsibilities. One of the more intangible of those duties and responsibilities is no matter what one's birth and background, to accept the historical past of the new country as one's own. ~ J.M. Coetzee

There seems to be a mountain of obstacles preventing people from being where their hearts want to be. It is so painful to watch and experience. The astonishing thing is that the battle for survival has become so "normal" that few people really believe that it can be different ... Oh how important is discipline, community, prayer, silence, caring presence, simple listening, adoration, and deep, lating faithful friendship. We all want it so much, and still the powers suggesting that all of that is fantasy are enormous. But we have to replace the battle for power with the battle to create space for the spirit. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

The higher you rise, the dirtier it gets. ~ J.M. August

The Father's love does not force itself on the beloved. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

If he can't handle it, then you aren't very good friends, are you? ~ J.M. Richards

Community thus is obedience practiced together. The question is not simply, "Where does God lead me as an individual person who tries to do his will?" More basic and more significant is the question, "Where does God lead us as a people?" This ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

It used to be that he, John, had too little employment. Now that is about to change. Now he will have as much employment as he can handle, as much and more. He is going to have to abandon some of his personal projects and be a nurse. Alternatively, if he will not be a nurse, he must announce to his father: I cannot face the prospect of ministering to you day and night. I am going to abandon you. Goodbye. One or the other: there is no third way. ~ J.M. Coetzee

For a quarter-century British governments had tried and failed to combine economic growth, increased social service provision and a high level of employment. The second depended ultimately on the first, but when difficulty arose, the first had always been sacrificed to the other two. The United Kingdom was, after all, a democracy whose votes, greedy and gullible, had to be placated. ~ J.M. Roberts