Kingston Quotes

Big money, big Liberal Party politics and big media are trying to get rid of us, of course, by letting Packer take over Fairfax - a media-only company. But we're hanging in there and doing the best job we can for our readers while we can. ~ Margo Kingston

Be careful what you say. It comes true. It comes true. I had to leave home in order to see the world logically, logic the new way of seeing. I learned to think that mysteries are for explanation. I enjoy the simplicity. Concrete pours out of my mouth to cover the forests with freeways and sidewalks. Give me plastics, periodical tables, TV dinners with vegetables no more complex than peas mixed with diced carrots. Shine floodlights into dark corners: no ghosts. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Because every man who fight monster become a monster too, and there be at least one woman in Kingston who think me is the killer of all things name hope. ~ Marlon James

The work of preservation demands that the feelings playing about in one's guts not be turned into action. Just watch their passing like cherry blossoms. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

To put it in my music, that's not the message I am trying to send out. That's not the type of artist I am trying to be. That is not the type of lane I am trying to take. I'm looking for a crossover, wide audience. I am here to make great music and pursue a great career and connect with the fans _ this big artist that is making great music and sending positive messages. ~ Sean Kingston

Marriage is an institution fits in perfect harmony with the laws of nature; whereas systems of slavery and segregation were designed to brutally oppress people and thereby violated the laws of nature. ~ Jack Kingston

My great-grandfather, Sam Aykroyd, was a dentist in Kingston, Ontario, and he was also an Edwardian spiritualist researcher who was very interested in what was going on in the invisible world, the survival of the consciousness, precipitated paintings, mediumship, and trans-channeling. ~ Dan Aykroyd

Human beings don't work like this in China. Time goes slower there. Here we have to hurry, feed the hungry children before we're too old to work. I feel like a mother cat hunting for its kittens. She has to find them fast because in a few hours she will forget how to count or that she had any kittens at all. I can't sleep in this country because it doesn't shut down for the night. Factories, canneries, restaurants - always somebody somewhere working through the night. It never gets done all at once here. Time was different in China. One year lasted as long as my total time here; one evening so long, you could visit your women friends, drink tea, and play cards at each house, and it would still be twilight. It even got boring, nothing to do but fan ourselves. Here midnight comes and the floor's not swept, the ironing's not ready, the money's not made. I would be still young if we lived in China. (1983: 98) ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

When I was in high school in the '50s you were supposed to be an Elvis Presley, a James Dean, a Marlon Brando or a Kingston Trio type in a button-down shirt headed for the fraternities at Stanford or Cal. ~ Robert Hass

There is no singular meaning of wife. That is the point. That is its meaning. To see the wife fully through a multi-faceted lens is one of the central challenges facing society in the twenty-first century. To do this, new scripts are required that employ wife as a verb and as a gender-neutral concept. These are essential if we are to create necessary new narratives, new ways of living as women and men together. ~ Anne Kingston

I've been writing since I was 7, but before that, I was orally making stories. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I don't think my looks are modern. I always imagined I'd end up doing Chekhov, Ibsen and Shakespeare all my life and never play a contemporary character. ~ Alex Kingston

A new darkness pulled away the room, inked out flesh and outlined bones. My mother was wide awake again. She become sharply herself - bone, wire, antenna - but she was not afraid. She had been pared down like this before, when she had travelled up the mountains into rare snow - alone in white not unlike being alone in black. She had also sailed a boat safely between land and land. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I make sure I always surround myself with good, down to earth, fun, real people, who always keep me grounded. ~ Sean Kingston

…I have changed/I am a dandelion puffball blur. My hair,/scribbles of white lines. My face. Lines/crisscross and zigzag my face./My eyes. I am looking into eyes/whose color has turned lighter, hazy brown./Wind and time are blowing me out." –Maxine Hong Kingston ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

This is the time to pull together as a Nation, as different people from all over the States with different perspectives and different social statuses and different income brackets, to unify into one and help those on the ground who need our help the most. ~ Jack Kingston

To write out the precepts again, we contend with them, and keep them; we build our humanity, and keep our humanity alive ... Thay has named the precepts 'wonderful' ... Wonderful because they can protect us, and show us how to live a joyous life, an interesting, adventurous, deep, large life, and how to be with one another, and with animals, plants, and all the Earth and universe. Wonderful because when we practice the precepts, we existentially become humane, we embody loving kindness ... Standing in the midst of burning ruins, I was glad that I knew the precepts. Though I kept their tenets imperfectly, even in aspiration I created some invisible good that could not be destroyed ... The Five Wonderful Precepts give clear and simple directions to finding that life. In devastation, I have blueprints for making home anew (90-92).
For a Future to Be Possible: Commentaries on the Five Wonderful Precepts ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Every choice you make is a right choice. What is really important is not the choice but the reason why you make it. Any choice made from fear is a disempowering choice. ~ Karen Kingston

The truth is, I'm not a coper. I hate stress. I might appear calm externally but internally it's all going on. ~ Alex Kingston

An American soldier, Saddam in his sights, has a picture of a naked, buxom woman on his dashboard, an obvious affront to Muslim sensibilities. ~ Margo Kingston

I describe me sound as international: reggae, pop, rap, R&B all in one. I think I have my own style. I can't really even describe it. People say, "What type of genre is your music?" It's Sean Kingston genre. I have my own genre. No disrespect to no artist or dudes out there. I feel like I am my own person. I am doing my own thing. ~ Sean Kingston

We're all a little broken. But that doesn't matter when someone loves you. ~ Amelia Kingston

The actress I had the most fun working with was Alex Kingston. It was a fun relationship to play because it was a combination of occasional sexual harrassment with genuine affection. She's such a terrific actress and such a lovely person. ~ Paul McCrane

Ocean people are very different from land people. The ocean never stops saying and asking into ears, which don't sleep like eyes. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

When we Chinese girls listened to the adults talk-story, we learned that we failed if we grew up to be but wives or slaves. We could be heroines, swordswomen. Even if she had to rage across all China, a swordswoman got even with anybody who hurt her family. Perhaps women were once so dangerous that they had to have their feet bound. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

After years of experience running the club on St. James, Sebastian could talk easily with anyone from royalty down to the most hardened street criminal. Soon he had the men smiling and volunteering information about their work at Eversby Priory.
"Your father has a common touch," came Mr. Ravenel's quiet voice near her ear. He watched Sebastian with a mix of interest and admiration. "One doesn't usually see that in a man of his position."
"He's always mocked the notion that vice runs more rampant among commoners than nobility," Phoebe said. "In fact, he says the opposite is usually true."
Mr. Ravenel looked amused. "He could be right. Although I've seen a fair share of vice among both. ~ Lisa Kleypas

Mothers who love their children take them along. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

My mom, she got taken away from me when I was 14 years old. She is incarcerated. My sister was incarcerated. I was homeless. When my mom went away when I was 14 ... I was forced to live with my aunt. My aunt, she doesn't like rap music. She thinks rap music is the devil's music. Basically she said, "Yo, if you are going to do music you can't do it in my house." ~ Sean Kingston

I've learned exactly who the enemy are. I easily recognize them-business-suited in their modern American executive guise, each boss two feet taller than I am and impossible to meet eye to eye. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

When these pictures burst, the stars drew yet further apart. Black space opened. She got to her feet to fight better ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Taking over Kingston Shoes would be the final string that would unravel and cut them off from one another for good. ~ Miranda Liasson

Could it be? Samantha Kingston? Home? On a Friday?"
I roll my eyes. "I don't know. Did you do a lot of acid in the sixties? Could be a flashback."
"I was two years old in 1960. I came too late for the party." He leans down and pecks me on the head. I pull away out of habit. "And I'm not even going to ask how you know about acid flashbacks."
"What's an acid flashback?" Izzy crows.
"Nothing," my dad and I say at the same time, and he smiles at me. ~ Lauren Oliver

The 1960s were big for folk music, and the Kingston Trio led the way. They were the ones who started it all. The music was fresh and alive. College kids loved it and their parents did, too. ~ George Grove

I love song writing, so I'm always happy to write for other musicians. ~ Sean Kingston

I think if you live in London, it's such a cosmopolitan city; nobody even notices different-race relationships. I assumed it would be even more liberal in the States, and it's totally the opposite. ~ Alex Kingston

Rupert Murdoch's vast newspaper empire has waged a relentless pro-war propaganda war before and since the war began. ~ Margo Kingston

For me, I hope last year was the last when anger, frustration and despair ruled my professional psychology. ~ Margo Kingston

Indeed, there are so many prejudices against everyday middle-class values on college campuses, and serving in the military and being pro-American just seems to be one of them. ~ Jack Kingston

So far, 44 States, or 88 percent of the States, have enacted laws providing that marriage shall consist of a union between a man and a woman. Only 75 percent of the States are required to approve a constitutional amendment. ~ Jack Kingston

Gods you avoid won't hurt you. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

So many people have the TV or radio constantly turned on "for company," or spend their time reading trashy novels, aimlessly surfing the Net, and so on. Then suddenly one day you are old or sick and you realize you have done nothing with your life. All your thoughts are other people's thoughts and you have no idea who you really are or what the purpose of your life might be. ~ Karen Kingston

I didn't have any qualms. I'm used to taking my clothes off in front of strangers. I've done it since I was 14 - with my mother's adult education art classes. She liked to paint and I went along as a life model. ~ Alex Kingston

David McKnight gives us the tools to work out where we stand - and what unites rather than divides us - as the struggle to defend our democracy begins in earnest ~ Margo Kingston

In America my mother has eyes as strong as boulders, never once skittering off a face, but she has not learned to place decorations and phonograph needles, nor has she stopped seeing land on the other side of the oceans. Now her eyes include the relatives in China, as they once included my father smiling and smiling in his many western outfits, a different one for each photograph that he sent from America. (1983: 59) ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

My goal is just to get healthy as far as what my ideal weight has to be for my height. ~ Sean Kingston

I regret always writing, writing. I gave
my kid the whole plastic bag of marshmallows,
so i could have 20 minutes to write.
I sat at my mother's deathbed, writing.
I did swab her mouth with water, and feel
her pliant tongue enjoy water, then harden
and die. Before I had language,
before I had stories, I wanted to write.
That desire is going away.
I've said what I have to say.
I'll stop and look at things I called
distractions. Become a reader of the world,
no more writer of it. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

His Good list outstripped the Evil list; Good may always preponderate in this method of reckoning. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

The part of River Song, the Doctor's companion in his eleventh incarnation, was originally offered to Kate Winslet. She turned it down and the part went to Alex Kingston. ~ Andy Bell

My job is my own only land. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

No husband of mine will say, "I could have been a drummer, but I had to think about the wife and kids. You know how it is." Nobody supports me at the expense of his own adventure. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

To the Hesitating Purchaser:
If sailor tales to sailor tunes,
Storm and adventure, heat and cold,
If schooners, islands, and maroons
And Buccaneers and buried Gold
And all the old romance, retold,
Exactly in the ancient way,
Can please, as me they pleased of old,
The wiser youngsters of to-day:
-So be it, and fall on! If not,
If studious youth no longer crave,
His ancient appetites forgot,
Kingston, or Ballantyne the brave,
Or Cooper of the wood and wave:
So be it, also! And may I
And all my pirates share the grave,
Where these and their creations lie! ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

I learned to shoot more accurately because my teachers held the targets. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

He sighed. 'Your life is your own,Miss Kingston. We have only one. Don't allow anyone else to dictate to you what you should do with yours.'
She blinked and frowned as if she didn't understand what he meant.
'It's yours,' he advised softly. 'Don't waste it on petty conventions or conformity. Swim against the tide if you want to. ~ Val Wood

When I am composing, I try to clear my mind of having to publish, or having to sell a book or find readers. That kind of thinking gets in the way. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

My attention determines the depth and quality of my experience. ~ Karen Kingston

Most people understand life expectancy has changed since Social Security started in 1937 when folks lived to be 59 years old. Today, they live to be 77 years old. ~ Jack Kingston

We were made to get along, to be together, and
it's a truth that's medically attested... Love and dance and connection strengthen every bodily system, while isolation, rage and sadness poison them with cortisol. ~ Steven Heighton

This is the most important thing about me
I'm a card-carrying reader. All I really want to do is sit and read or lie down and read or eat and read or shit and read. I'm a trained reader. I want a job where I get paid for reading books. And I don't have to make reports on what I read or to apply what I read. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Simon Crean has painstakingly built a platform for a potentially devastating assault on Howard's fitness for office. ~ Margo Kingston

Let my life as Poet begin. I want the life of the Poet. I have labored for over twelve years, one thousand pages of prose. Now, I want the easiness of poetry. The brevity of the poem. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I think Social Security should be bipartisan and it should transcend the next election, and you should get the best ideas of the Democrats and of the Republicans, and move forward with the best. ~ Jack Kingston

But here's the thing
no matter how many possessions you have, you never feel secure. As soon as you get one thing, there is always something else you "need". ~ Karen Kingston

It's easy to gain weight when you're in the studio. ~ Sean Kingston

It's wrong for women to be constantly shy and embarrassed about their bodies. There are so many images of unattainable beauty that are so destructive. It's important to show how your body really is. As the cliche has it, beauty comes from within. ~ Alex Kingston

Beautiful girls. They only want to do you dirt. They'll have you suicidal, suicidal when they say it's over. ~ Sean Kingston

I was born in St. Andrew's and raised in Kingston then I attended the Alpha Boy's school. ~ Desmond Dekker

Hunger also changes the world - when eating can't be a habit, than neither can seeing. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Ages of experience have taught humanity that the commitment of a husband and wife to love and to serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society. ~ Jack Kingston

I was raised with opera and very white-bread folk music like The Kingston Trio. That was about as daring as it got. So when I discovered hip-hop as a teenager, at first it made no sense to me at all. ~ Jess Row

I love playing strong feisty women, I really do, but if you were to ask my husband he'd probably say that I'm very insecure. And actually incredibly malleable, which isn't necessarily a good thing. ~ Alex Kingston

In a deft and well-practiced move, the man smoothly hooked an arm around Larson's neck, grasped his wrist, and pushed the hand with the gun toward the floor.
Even before West had a good look at the newcomer's face, he recognized the smooth, dry voice with its cut-crystal tones, so elegantly commanding it could have belonged to the devil himself. ~ Lisa Kleypas

I drop my forehead to hers and vow, "I will feed you when you're hungry. I will keep you safe when you're scared. I will hold you when you're hurt. I will find you when you're lost. I will tell you that you're my goddess every single day. And I will love you no matter what." I kiss her with what I can only describe as unending devotion. ~ Amelia Kingston

If singing were a feeling it would be this, this light, this lifting, like laughing ... ~ Lauren Oliver

What are you going to do for a living? Yea, you're going to have to work because you can't be a housewife. Somebody has to marry you before you can be a housewife. And you, you are a plant. Do you know that? That's all you are if you don't talk. If you don't talk, you can't have a personality. You'll have no personality and no hair. You've got to let people know you have a personality and a brain. You think somebody is going to take care of you all your stupid life? You think you'll always have your big sister? You think somebody's going to marry you, is that it? Well you're not the type that gets dates, let alone gets married. Nobody's going to notice you. And you have to talk for interviews, speak right up in front of the boss. Don't you know that? ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

And there was huge numbers of UFOs around my parents home in Kingston. ~ Betty Hill

Marriage is sacred and protected and has nothing to do with violating our civil rights. ~ Jack Kingston

As they walked back to the laundry, Brave Orchid showed her sister where to buy the various groceries and how to avoid Skid Row. "On days when you are not feeling safe, walk around it. But you can walk through it unharmed on your strong days." On weak days you notice bodies on the sidewalk, and you are visible to Panhandler Ghosts and Mugger Ghosts. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

You can't eat straight A's. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

He seemed every bit as riled and menacing as the bull had a few minutes ago. But Phoebe wasn't about to let him make his injury worse out of pure male stubbornness.
"Forgive me if I'm being tyrannical," she said in her most soothing tone. "I tend to do that when I'm concerned about someone. It's your decision, naturally. But I wish you would indulge me in this, if only to spare me from worrying over you every step of the way home."
The mulish set of his jaw eased. "I manage other people," he informed her. "People don't manage me."
"I'm not managing you."
"You're trying," he said darkly.
An irrepressible grin spread across her face. "Is it working?"
Slowly Mr. Ravenel's head lifted. He didn't reply, only gave her a strange, long look that spurred her heartbeat until she was light-headed from the force of its pounding. No man had ever stared at her like this. Not even her husband, for whom she'd always been close and attainable, her presence woven securely into the fabric of his days. Since childhood, she'd always been Henry's safe harbor.
But whatever it was this man wanted from her, it wasn't safety.
"You should humor my daughter's wishes, Ravenel," Sebastian advised from behind her. "The last time I tried to refuse her something, she launched into a screaming fit that lasted at least an hour."
The comment broke the trance. "Father," Phoebe protested with a laugh, twisting to glance at him over her shoulder. "I was two years old!"< ~ Lisa Kleypas

You must not tell anyone, what I am about to tell you. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I believe I can steal Fairfax's reputation in six months. It is an empty edifice. It has collapsed. ~ Margo Kingston

I welcome the Democrats' ideas on Social Security. I think it is very important to make a bipartisan reform. ~ Jack Kingston

To me success means effectiveness in the world, that I am able to carry my ideas and values into the world - that I am able to change it in positive ways. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

What does old look like? Sometimes I am wrinkled, sometimes not. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Every aspect of your life is anchored energetically in your living space, so clearing clutter can completely transform your entire existence. ~ Karen Kingston

[What to do with] Unwanted Gifts

This can be a very sensitive issue for many people. However, here's my very best advice on what to do with unwanted presents: get rid of them. Here's why. Things you really love have a strong, vibrant energy field around them, whereas unwanted presents have uneasy, conflicting energies attached to them that drain you rather than energize you. They actually create an energetic gloom in your home.

The very thought of giving them the elbow is horrifying to some people. "But what about when Aunt Jane comes to visit and that expensive decoration she gave us isn't on the mantelpiece?" Whose mantlepiece is it anyway? If you love the item, fine, but if you keep it in your home out of fear and obligation, you were giving your power away. Every time you walk into the room and see that object, your energy levels drop.

And don't think that out of sight, out of mind will work. You can't keep that gift in the cupboard and just bring it out when Aunt Jane is due to visit. Your subconscious mind still knows you have it on the premises. If you have enough of these unwanted presents around you, your energy network looks like a sieve, with vitality running out all over the place.

Remember, it's the thought that counts. You can appreciate being given the gift without necessarily having to keep it. Try adopting a whole different philosophy about presents. When you give something to someone, give it with love and let it g ~ Karen Kingston

As I write, Kim Beazley has the numbers and the game looks over. ~ Margo Kingston

I used to live in Ethiopia as a child, and I lived there when Haile Selassie was the emperor. ~ Jack Kingston

I go back five generations in Jamaica. My dad grew up in Port Royal, and my mom grew up in Kingston. My family is from the country like West Moreland and also in Manchester. I've been there countless times. As far as cuisine, there's not really much that comes out of Jamaica that's on a plate that I don't like. ~ Dule Hill

Children's programming in America, I think it's pretty shoddy in terms of lack of diversity. It's pretty much cartoons and Disney sort of shows. I don't find any of that stimulating for children. ~ Alex Kingston

In his life, he'd had more than his share of lectures, some brutal enough to leave permanent gouges in his soul. But no man had ever spoken to him quite like this- wry, honest, direct, bracing, and a bit high-handed in a way that felt oddly reassuring. Fatherly. ~ Lisa Kleypas

As he lifted his head, he saw a painting on the wall, in a carved and gilded frame. It was a luminous portrait of the Duchess with her children when they were still young. The group was arranged on the settee, with Ivo, still an infant, on his mother's lap. Gabriel, Raphael, and Seraphina were seated on either side of her, while Phoebe leaned over the back of the settee. Her face was close to her mother's, her expression tender and slightly mischievous, as if she were about to tell her a secret or make her laugh. ~ Lisa Kleypas

Any merchant who advertises 'Honest Scales' must have been thinking about weighing them. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I really like the reggae concepts like the culture vibe. They speak on everything that's going on, they don't have limits. They speak on politics, they speak on life, they speak on the troubles of poverty, everything. The message, the melodies and the concepts of reggae music are unbelievable. ~ Sean Kingston

With everything that is going on with hip-hop and with what everybody is doing I don't want to be in that lane. I think my lane is very different. ~ Sean Kingston

In Ethiopia, democracy is in its infancy and it must be nurtured along by its leaders. ~ Jack Kingston

I was speaking well because I was talking to her; there are people who dry up language. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

Long ago in China, knot-makers tied string into buttons and frogs, and rope into bell pulls. There was one knot so complicated that it blinded the knot-maker. Finally an emperor outlawed this cruel knot, and the nobles could not order it anymore. If I had lived in China, I would have been an outlaw knot-maker. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

I'd like to go to New Society Village someday and find out exactly how far I can walk before people stop talking like me. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston

There's something in life that's a curtain, and I keep trying to raise it. ~ Maxine Hong Kingston