Roots Of My Obsession Quotes

One of the best tricks a garden plays is that you never quite remember how it's going to be, that first day after winter has gone, when you go outside and can stay outside all day fiddling with jobs that aren't pressing enough to weigh heavily but will nevertheless pay dividends. A garden is made up of a thousand small inventions, but each small act is a defence (defiance even) against a world without anchors or safe harbours. ~ Anna Pavord

There's a theme that appears in much of your work," I say to Maurice on my last visit to Connecticut, "and I can only hint at it because it's difficult to formulate or describe. It has something to do with the lines: 'As I went over the water/the water went over me' [from As I Went over the Water] or 'I'm in the milk and the milk's in me' [from Night Kitchen]."

"Obviously I have one theme, and it's even in the book I'm working on right now. It's not that I have such original ideas, just that I'm good at doing variations on the same idea over and over again. You can't imagine how relieved I was to find out that Henry James admitted he had only a couple of themes and that all of his books were based on them. That's all we need as artists - one power-driven fantasy or obsession, then to be clever enough to do variations… like a series of variations by Mozart. They're so good that you forget they're based on one theme. The same things draw me, the same images…"

"What is this one obsession?"

"I'm not about to tell you - not because it's a secret, but because I can't verbalize it."

"There's a line by Bob Dylan in 'Just Like a Woman' which talks about being 'inside the rain.'"

"Inside the rain?"

"When it's raining outside," I explain, "I often feel inside myself, as if I were inside the rain… as if the rain were my self. That's the sense I get from Dylan's image and from your books as well."

"It's strange y ~ Jonathan Cott

I took a great deal of pleasure in it, and I still feel nostalgic about it. However, I felt that it had led me to live in a parallel world of pure invention, shut inside my solitude. Naturally, it was precisely for that purpose that it was made and that was why I took pleasure in it, but I wanted to regain body and roots. ~ Jean Dubuffet

Even as a fan, as someone who's into his performances, the Stooges and his own stuff, Iggy [Pop] is one of the people who kept underlining something that a lot of my older musician friends with punk roots say: you get into this space in your life where you feel like a weirdo, you're marginalised, you don't fit in ... and then you can get up on stage in front of people who probably hate you. ~ Babatunde Adebimpe

You thought I was that type: that you could forget me, and that I'd plead and weep and throw myself under the hooves of a bay mare, or that I'd ask the sorcerers for some magic potion made from roots and send you a terrible gift: my precious perfumed handkerchief. Damn you! I will not grant your cursed soul vicarious tears or a single glance. And I swear to you by the garden of the angels, I swear by the miracle-working ikon, and by the fire and smoke of our nights: I will never come back to you. ~ Anna Akhmatova

An obsession might be a little strong a term, but it has now become one of the most significant aspects of my life, but most importantly of my career, because it has changed the public's perception of who Patrick Stewart is, ~ Patrick Stewart

Trees, now - Slothrop's intensely alert to trees, finally. When he comes in among trees he will spend time touching them, studying them, sitting very quietly near them and understanding that each tree is a creature, carrying on its individual life, aware of what's happening around it, not just some hunk of wood to be cut down. Slothrop's family actually made its money killing trees, amputating them from their roots, chopping them up, grinding them to pulp, bleaching that to paper and getting paid for this with more paper. "That's really insane." He shakes his head. "There's insanity in my family." He looks up. The trees are still. They know he's there. They probably also know what he's thinking. "I'm sorry," he tells them. "I can't do anything about those people, they're all out of my reach. What can I do?" A medium-size pine nearby nods its top and suggests, "Next time you come across a logging operation out here, find one of their tractors that isn't being guarded, and take its oil filter with you. That's what you can do. ~ Thomas Pynchon

Wood burns. Roots nourish. Branches shelter. Leaves heal." The words had become her mantra, her way of reigniting her courage when it started to falter. My life depends on a tree, she thought wryly as she cinched her pack. ~ Teresa Tsalaky

My rage and sense of alienation as to how women have been written, have allowed themselves to be written, in so many ways, has political roots. ~ Kate Zambreno

On summer evenings, when every flower, and tree, and bird, might have better addressed my soft young heart, I have in my day been caught in the palm of a female hand by the crown, have been violently scrubbed from the neck to the roots of the hair as a purification for the Temple, and have then been carried off highly charged with saponaceous electricity, to be steamed like a potato in the unventilated breath of the powerful Boanerges Boiler and his congregation, until what small mind I had, was quite steamed out of me ~ Charles Dickens

I'll never lose my roots. I think I'm too close to my family for that. I still make my trip back to Nebraska every year, and I still love going back to Texas where I grew up, as well. I've just kind of had to mature a little bit more and get used to a little bit different style of life. ~ Andy Roddick

If he gave me a knife, he thought I'd need it. And not for digging up roots and hacking tree bark, either. Know its purpose, indeed. "It fits my hand," I said, looking down and stroking the small groove that fit my thumb. "How did you know to make it so exactly?" He laughed at that. "I've had your hand round my cock often enough to know the measure of your grip, Sassenach, ~ An Echo In The Bone.

I'm sort of a Southerner because those are my roots, but my parents are from Iowa. ~ Geneva Carr

I think the Lower East Side inspires me. That whole neighborhood, a lot of the people that I worked with, seeing what we've gone through in life, being given an opportunity to understand who I am; my identity, my culture, and my roots. ~ Luis Guzman

I was growing inward incessantly; like an animal that hibernates during the wintertime, I could hear other peoples' voices with my ears; my own voice, however, I could hear only in my throat. The loneliness and the solitude that lurked behind me were like a condensed, thick, eternal night, like one of those nights with a dense, persistent, sticky darkness which waits to pounce on unpopulated cities filled with lustful and vengeful dreams. My whole being could now be summed up in my voice―an insane, absolute record. The force that, out of loneliness, brings two individuals together to procreate has its roots in this same insanity which exists in everyone and which is mingled with a sense of regret, tending gradually toward death...Only death does not tell lies! The presence of death annihilates all that is imaginary. We are the offspring of death and death delivers us from the tantalizing, fraudulent attractions of life; it is death that beckons us from the depths of life. ~ Sadegh Hedayat

My introduction to the Brady book was an attempt to nail the exact same idea since Brady addressed the point. And since I write pornography, naturally, something of an obsession for me. ~ Peter Sotos

When I look at what I'm doing today, I see [the] roots in my college life. I was the online editor of my college paper and an active member of the Harvard Computer Society. I abandoned a summer internship at the Washington Post due to injury and instead did theatre. I found my comedic voice through satirical newsletters in college. ~ Baratunde Thurston

The thought of her gave me such a continual anguish that I could no more forget her than an aching tooth. It was involuntary, hopeless, compulsive. For years she had been the first thing I remembered when I woke up, the last thing that drifted through my mind as I went to sleep, and during the day she came to me obtrusively, obsessively, always with a painful shock. ~ Donna Tartt

I can understand that people want to feel special and important and so on, but that self-obsession seems a bit pathetic somehow. Not being able to accept that you're just this collection of cells, intelligent to whatever degree, capable of feeling emotion to whatever degree, for a limited amount of time and so on, on this tiny little rock orbiting this not particularly important sun in one of just 400m galaxies, and whatever other levels of reality there might be via something like brane-theory [of multiple dimensions] … really, it's not about you. It's what religion does with this drive for acknowledgement of self-importance that really gets up my nose. 'Yeah, yeah, your individual consciousness is so important to the universe that it must be preserved at all costs' – oh, please. Do try to get a grip of something other than your self-obsession. How Californian. The idea that at all costs, no matter what, it always has to be all about you. Well, I think not. ~ Iain M. Banks

I came from a race of fishers; trout streams gurgled about the roots of my family tree. ~ John Burroughs

You don't have to lie to me to be nice, Jake. You can just say, 'Wow, your nails look crappy.'" I did my best boy voice.
"Well, I will tell you that's a crappy imitation of my voice." He smiled so wide I could see his eyetooth from across the table. "But you've got to know you're totally hot, chipped nails and all." He burned beet red all the way to the roots of his hair. "Man, you get me to say some embarrassing stuff, Brenna." He rubbed his hand on the back of his neck.
"Hey, don't blame me when you feel moved to make strange declarations. ~ Liz Reinhardt

It wasn't healthy, my obsession with her, but it felt amazing. I never wanted to be apart from her. I wanted to live in her. Breathe her into me every second of every day, but reality was real, and that wasn't something I could do. ~ Tabatha Vargo

My guess is that fearful events are the hardest to root out. They're the ones we naturally remember the best, after all. ~ Suzanne Collins

What I feel for her is a wholly different emotion. It stands and walks on its own, living and breathing and throbbing and shaking me to the roots of my being. ~ Haruki Murakami

I went to L.A., and I was on two different studio movies at Fox and Sony, but they were never made in the end. When the second one wasn't happening, I ended up doing an episode of 'Who Do You Think You Are?' for the BBC, and went on a roots trip from England to Kenya, India, and pre-partition India in Pakistan, where my family originally came from. ~ Gurinder Chadha

That's definitely true! It was before my father died, so I can't attribute it to an obsession with death. When I was seven, I loved those old Sherlock Holmes movies with Basil Rathbone. The Scarlet Claw was one of my faves. And I loved all the Halloween's and that film about the haunted house ... Burnt Offerings, with Oliver Reed. Every birthday party was a slumber party and we'd watch horror films. ~ Cate Blanchett

I have said that Texas is a state of mind, but I think it is more than that. It is a mystique closely approximating a religion. And this is true to the extent that people either passionately love Texas or passionately hate it and, as in other religions, few people dare to inspect it for fear of losing their bearings in mystery or paradox. But I think there will be little quarrel with my feeling that Texas is one thing. For all its enormous range of space, climate, and physical appearance, and for all the internal squabbles, contentions, and strivings, Texas has a tight cohesiveness perhaps stronger than any other section of America. Rich, poor, Panhandle, Gulf, city, country, Texas is the obsession, the proper study, and the passionate possession of all Texans. ~ John Steinbeck

Being a martial artist for many years, it has become a bit of an obsession of mine to bring that part of my life to the screen. ~ Sundra Oakley

The real romance in life didn't come in that first sweet taste of love, as profound and life changing as it was. There was love then, yes. Obsession, passion, infatuation. All of that and more.
But the true romance came from the slow lapse of time, the inexorable passing of days, weeks, months, years decades.
I'd hold onto her with the last breath in my body. My final thought would be that I hadn't gotten enough, I just knew it.
Because I would never have enough. ~ R.K. Lilley

Slow me down, Lord. Ease the pounding of my heart by the quieting of my mind. Steady my hurried pace with a vision of the eternal reach of time. Give me, amid the confusion of the day, the calmness of the everlasting hills. Break the tensions of my nerves and muscles with the soothing music of the singing streams that live in my memory. Teach me the art of taking minute vacations - of slowing down to look at a flower, to chat with a friend, to pat a dog, to smile at a child, to read a few lines from a good book. Slow me down, Lord, and inspire me to send my roots deep into the soil of life's enduring values, that I may grow toward my greater destiny. Remind me each day that the race is not always to the swift; that there is more to life than increasing its speed. Let me look upward to the towering oak and know that it grew great and strong because it grew slowly and well. ~ Chip Ingram

The Crippled God scattered some seeds onto the brazier's coals. Popping sounds, then more smoke. 'Peace. Warm yourself, warrior, while I tell you of peace. History is unerring, and even the least observant mortal can be made to understand, through innumerable repetition. Do you see peace as little more than the absence of war? Perhaps, on a surface level, it is just that. But let me describe the characteristics of peace, my young friend. A pervasive dulling of the senses, a decadence afflicting the culture, evinced by a growing obsession with low entertainment. The virtues of extremity - honour, loyalty, sacrifice - are lifted high as shoddy icons, currency for the cheapest of labours. The longer peace lasts, the more those words are used, and the weaker they become. Sentimentality pervades daily life. All becomes a mockery of itself, and the spirit grows…restless. ~ Steven Erikson

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer ~ Dylan Thomas

I have any number of completely dark obsessions and fascinations, and none of this was present in my profile or my growing profile as a writer. ~ Justin Cronin

The angel in man
has also been my own life-long obsession. In a sense I believe it has always been the problem of the creative being ... obsessed ... with the idea of re-creating the world in order, as I see it, to re-establish man's innocence. ~ Henry Miller

I'm Egyptian and Muslim, but I grew up in the West, far from my Arab roots. I began 'Sex and the Citadel' to help outsiders - like myself - to better comprehend this pivotal part of the world, up-close and personal. ~ Shereen El Feki

Creativity is alive
And thriving in my body.
The energy you bring out in me
Is within me infinitely.
My power is overflowing.
My lips are soft and welcoming
To the exhale,
The new Braille,
The silence that persists
After our moans die away,
I look at myself and say,
"Root down so you can burn.
Beautiful girl, it's your turn
To create magic within yourself.
This time, without his help.
Find your roots and find your fire,
Be mindful of what you desire,
Persist in what you know is true,
Stay focused on the endless route
Toward your own potential.
Allow the existential
Void to swallow you whole.
Take on your old role:
The lone seeker.
Become quieter.
Become meeker.
Become the beauty that you seek.
Embody strength if you feel weak.
Find love within the walls
Of this sacred temple.
Let yourself shake and tremble,
But keep your eyes ever fixed
On the horizon
Where it's rising,
No revising,
Fears capsizing
As you sail, sail, sail
Toward the wail
Of your siren spirit
Beckoning you to bloom
The flower in your womb,
The seed of creativity,
Your triumphant legacy."
These words, I will carry
Within me as I bury
Grains of wisdom
In the whispers of the wind.
And when I arrive
To the altar of our origin,
I'll be dressed in white and black,
A ~ Vironika Tugaleva

Audrey kept moving with practiced quickness, stepping over roots protruding over the trail and pushing ferns and branches out of her way. She kept a brisk pace, but Kaldar didn't mind. From his vantage point, he had an excellent view of her shapely butt. It was a butt that deserved some scrutiny.
"If you're waiting for my behind to do a trick, you're out of luck," Audrey called over her shoulder.
"How the hell did you even know?" Did she have eyes on the back of her head?
"Woman's intuition," she told him.
"Aha, so it wouldn't be the fact that I stumbled twice in the last minute?"
"Not at all. ~ Ilona Andrews

My theory stands as firm as a rock; every arrow directed against it will return quickly to its archer. How do I know this? Because I have studied it from all sides for many years; because I have examined all objections which have ever been made against the infinite numbers; and above all because I have followed its roots, so to speak, to the first infallible cause of all created things. ~ Georg Cantor

Maybe for some people, falling in love is an explosion, fireworks against a black sky and tremors rumbling through the earth. One blazing moment. For me, it's been happening for months, as quietly as a seed sprouting. Love sneaked through me, spreading roots around my heart, until, in the blink of an eye, the green of it broke the dirt: hidden one moment, there the next. ~ Emily Henry

May I be a pillar
on which upon you stand,
a leaning post for young ones,
my lover and my friend.
May I be a beam of light that you bestow upon
your hopes, your dreams, your wisdom,
so we may carry on.

May I be a beacon,
a tree with roots so strong,
treetop spreading high and wide,
a trunk so wide and long.
May I be your music
a flute for you to play
whatever you desire
with each forthcoming day.

May I lose myself to find you,
support all those who need
my love, my core, my laughter,
permeate my every deed. ~ Petra Poje - Keeper Of The Eye

Could I make tongue say more than tongue could utter! Could I make brain grasp more than brain could think! Could I weave into immortal denseness some small brede of words, pluck out of sunken depths the roots of living, some hundred thousand magic words that were as great as all my hunger, and hurl the sum of all my living out upon three hundred pages - then death could take my life, for I had lived it ere he took it: I had slain hunger, beaten death! ~ Thomas Wolfe

You will become reconciled with legality and with that root of roots, the national community, returning, like the prodigal son, to the paternal home. You are now a lawless city. You will not have a government to tell you what you should and should not do, how you should and should not behave, the streets will be yours, they belong to you, use them as you wish, there will be no authority to stop you in your tracks and offer you sound advice, but equally, and listen carefully to my words, there will be no authority to protect you from thieves, rapists and murderers, that will be your freedom, and may you enjoy it. ~ Jose Saramago

When I was a child, I probably should have been medicated about my obsession with The Spice Girls. I had the Buffalo shoes, a customised Baby Spice necklace - when I say custom-made, it was made out of plastic from the local mall - and a Union Jack dress. ~ Blake Lively

I know love because I am in love. Because of how long I've loved. Because of the man I love.

Love used to be a beautiful mirage, a moonbeam on the water I tried to cup in my hands. Now it is a grand oak tre, tried and tested, roots driving deep down into the earth. I have a love that takes me across oceans. A love that tells me I am home, no matter where I am in the world. ~ Lang Leav

I learn from thinking about the future, what hasn't been done yet. That's kind of my constant obsession. ~ John Cale

I don't really need to appeal to some stockbroker, and I always sort of root for the underdog. I probably consider all that when I'm writing, but it's not in the forefront of my brain. ~ Eric Bachmann