Unsavory Elements Quotes

The key to successful change is sensitivity towards that which is indigenous and, in the long run, diversity will always be more resilient than monoculture despite the current unsustainable trends in the opposite direction. ~ Jonathan Watts

This communal parenting brought me out of the privacy of our foreign enclave and into the public life of the community. Here, parenting was everyone's responsibility; all adults were "aunties" and "uncles". ~ Aminta Arrington

The rural Chinese in Henan Province mixed alcohol and business like you wouldn't believe. Perhaps as a result, they also had a charming nationalistic blind spot: they honestly believed they could out-drink everyone else on the planet. As an Irish-American who outweighed them by 50 pounds, I had come to find this both amusing and useful. ~ Matthew Polly

Why was I still traveling? Was it purely because it was better than turning around and going home, where I would have to make grown-up choices about my future? Or was I waiting to happen across a place that would tell me to stay? ~ Pete Spurrier

After he told them we were dating, which came out more like a Cultural Revolution confession than a family heart-to-heart, his father said flatly, "You can be friends with a foreign woman, but not date her. ~ Jocelyn Eikenburg

Bu keyi, Cannot. It was one of the first Mandarin phrases I learned, and it is the phrase of choice for all things forbidden, out of bounds, not possible, or otherwise not allowed. Its meaning seems to vacillate with circumstances: sometimes bu keyi means no, sometimes it suggests maybe, and sometimes it even hints at yes. ~ Deborah Fallows

Together we gazed out over corkscrew switchbacks cut through a barren, rocky landscape stretching to the horizon. It was simultaneously awesome and insane to be in this spot as a family, though, for a flicker of an instant, the lone explorer in me longed to be out there alone with just a 4x4. ~ Alan Paul

That car, as with the rest of Mr. Mao's lifestyle, was brand new. He had gotten rich, and gotten rich quick. But like the rest of his generation of Chinese Jay Gatsbys, the source of his wealth was murky. ~ Michael Levy

No wonder prostitution is so rampant in China, I mused as I watched the four girls watch us: why stand on your feet all day for slave wages when you can get rich on your back? ~ Tom Carter

Not sure how much longer she can continue her fight for the children or how much more of her there is to give, she pledged to keep going until she no longer can. ~ Kay Bratt

I hit him as hard as I could. His hands were full of my belongings, and every time I punched him he dropped something. I slugged him and my camera popped out; I hit him again and there was my money belt; another punch and my shorts flew up in the air. ~ Peter Hessler

I had to pace my consumption cannily, because each time I finished what was in my bowl, someone would immediately fill it up with something else. "Eat more," they would say. "Eat more pig's ear! ~ Dan Washburn

It's the bonds forged over baijiu, more than anything else, that keep me coming back for another ganbei despite the hiccups, figurative and literal. You can learn more about someone after three shots of baijiu than in years of sober tea sipping. ~ Derek Sandhaus

When we pay attention to this history, a pattern emerges: first, the Redeemers attacked voting rights. Then they attacked public education, labor, fair tax policies, and progressive leaders. Then they took over the state and federal courts, so they could be used to render rulings that would undermine the hope of a new America. This effort culminated in the landmark case Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, which upheld the constitutionality of state laws requiring segregation of public facilities under the doctrine "separate but equal." And then they made sure that certain elements had guns so that they could return the South back to the status quo ante, according to their deconstructive immoral philosophy. ~ William J. Barber II

I feel that every professional is the art school for the next guy. I feel that maybe a lot of the dynamism in my own work, having been felt by the rest of the artists, they'll react to it and put elements of that in their own work, feeling that it'll help it. ~ Jack Kirby

As we cleared the passage we found mixed with the rubble broken potsherds, jar seals, and numerous fragments of small objects; water skins lying on the floor together with alabaster jars, whole and broken, and coloured pottery vases; all pertaining to some disturbed burial, but telling us nothing to whom they belonged further than by their type which was of the late XVIIIth Dyn. These were disturbing elements as they pointed towards plundering. ~ Howard Carter

In my classes, we read great fiction obsessively, and then attempt to see how a writer managed to affect us. We try to understand which elements - diction, syntax, point of view and so forth - made us feel that way. After we spend several weeks reading this way, wondering how the author made us shiver like that, we try our own hand. I ask students to begin with 'green lines,' to isolate writing so good it makes one writer envious of another. Which parts do they wish they had written themselves? Students start to understand how their own writing works, where it ripples with energy… What they really want is to have some kind of firsthand, visceral relationship with a book - to see what it's like to take a work apart and put it back together - using great stories as structural models, just the way the kids I grew up with in Detroit fell in love with cars by spending weekends trying to make derelict Ford Mustangs run again. When the engine finally starts, when you figure out how to make it fire, it's an incredibly powerful learning experience. ~ Dean Bakopoulos

Perhaps it is because Venice is both liquid and solid, both air and stone, that it somehow combines all the elements crucial to make our imaginations ignite and turn fantasies into realities. ~ Erica Jong

The longing for improvement and the fear of waste and worse - it is a pattern still with us, and maybe it speaks to the medium's essential marriage of light and dark, or as Mary Pickford put it in her autobiography (published in 1955), Sunshine and Shadow. Light and dark were the elements of film, and they had their chemistry in film's emulsion. They had a moral meaning, too. But not everyone appreciated that prospect, or credited how it might make your fortune. ~ David Thomson

Make rituals of the important elements of your work. It ensures that they get done without much conscious thought. ~ Mani S. Sivasubramanian

Mephistopheles: Within the bowels of these elements,
Where we are tortured and remain forever.
Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribed
In one self place, for where we are is hell,
And where hell is must we ever be.
And, to conclude, when all the world dissolves,
And every creature shall be purified,
All places shall be hell that is not heaven. ~ Christopher Marlowe

Here the four elements of solidity, fluidity, heat and motion have no place; the notions of length and breadth, the subtle and the gross, good and evil, name and form are altogether destroyed; neither this world nor the other, nor coming, going or standing, neither death nor birth, nor sense-objects are to be found. ~ Walpola Rahula

Translating how that latter fact came to life in the studio, engineer Chuck Zwicky explained from his own observations during the recording of the album that "the way that Prince's music comes together has everything to do with how he views the individual instruments, and for example, when he's sitting down at the drums, he's derivatively thinking about Dave Gerbaldi, the drummer from Tower of Power, and that's a real fascile and funky drummer; and when he plays keyboards, he's thinking about James Brown's horn player, on one aspect; and when he's playing guitar, other elements creep in, because he loves Carlos Santana, and Jimi Hendrix, and this other guitar player named Bill Nelson, a rock guitar player from the 70s. And so these aspects all come together to make this unique sound that is Prince, and it's not rock, it's not funk, it's not jazz, it's not blues - it's just his own kind of music. I remember there was one particular moment when he started playing this keyboard line, and I'm thinking 'He can't play that, that's Gary Newman.' And at that moment, he stops the tape, and turns and looks at me and asks 'Do you like Gary Newman?' And I said 'You know, the album Replica never left my turntable in Jr. High School after my sister bought it for me. I listened to it until it wore out.' And he said 'There are people still trying to figure out what a genius he is. ~ Jake Brown

Historically, it is traditional and habitual for us to be inadequately prepared. This is the combined result of a number factors, the character of which is only indicated: democracy, which tends to make everyone believe that he knows it all; the preponderance, inherent in democracy, of people whose real interest is in their own welfare as individuals; the glorification of our own victories in war and the corresponding ignorance of our defeats - and disgraces - and of their basic causes; the inability of the average individual to understand the cause and effect not only in foreign but domestic affairs, as well as his lack of interest in such matters. Added to these elements is the manner in which our representative form of government has developed as to put a premium on mediocrity and to emphasize the defects of the electorate already mentioned ~ Ernest J. King

Time is our element, not a mistaken invader. ~ John Updike

What eludes logic is the most precious element in us, and one can draw nothing from a syllogism that the mind has not put there in advance. ~ Andre Gide

If you have received a letter inviting you to speak at the dedication of a new cat hospital, and you hate cats, your reply, declining the invitation, does not necessarily have to cover the full range of your emotions. You must make it clear that you will not attend, but you do not have to let fly at the cats. The writer of the letter asked a civil question; attack cats, then, only if you can do so with good humor, good taste, and in such a way that your answer will be courteous as well as responsive. Since you are out of sympathy with cats, you may quite properly give this as a reason for not appearing at the dedicatory ceremonies of a cat hospital. But bear in mind that your opinion of cats was not sought, only your services as a speaker. Try to keep things straight. ~ William Strunk Jr.

We have to make sure that women's issues are an essential element on the agendas of all heads of state, all governments. ~ Michelle Bachelet

If men make war in slavish observance of rules, they will fail. No rules will apply to conditions of war as different as those which exist in Europe and America ... War is progressive, because all the instruments and elements of war are progressive. ~ Ulysses S. Grant

A woman mixed of such fine elements
That were all virtue and religion dead
She'd make them newly, being what she was. ~ George Eliot

Monochromatic color schemes are lacking in contrast, which is why I start many of my canvas or paper pieces in this way. I can add layers of contrasting elements later on if desired. Adding tints and shades will give you a larger range of colors with which to create a richness of hues in your projects. ~ Roxanne Padgett

The naked figures in the landscape have willingly undressed for my camera. They are either perfect beings heroically occupying their Edens, or else they are gardeners after the Fall, lost and exposed to both the elements and the lens. ~ Justine Kurland

I don't know if it was the cold sincerity in my voice or the shock of being straddled by a wild, mud covered woman, but he didn't try to argue. Give me your ring. Now. ~ Heather James

To suffer with the other and for others; to suffer for the sake of truth and justice; to suffer out of love and in order to become a person who truly loves these are fundamental elements of humanity, and to abandon them would destroy man himself. ~ Pope Benedict XVI

I do think there is a completely different notion to glamour today. I think modern glamour is more effortless, easy, and real. Moreover, I think it's about constantly challenging classical ideas by bringing in unexpected and different elements; for example a long, elegant evening skirt paired with a simple t-shirt on the red carpet. I think this approach is the future. ~ Roksanda Ilincic

So much for progress. How quickly civilization could dissolve into its more ugly elements. ~ Kate Atkinson

I'm a big fan of Henri Cartier-Bresson, the French photographer who had that whole "decisive moment" approach to taking pictures, of having multiple elements line up within the frame. ~ Nick Zinner

It was as if for the remainder of his life he was condemned to carry with him the egos of certain people, early met and early loved, and to be only as complete as they were complete themselves. There was some element of loneliness involved
so easy to be loved
so hard to love. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

Temporality is obviously an organised structure, and these three so-called elements of time: past, present, future, must not be envisaged as a collection of 'data' to be added together ... but as the structured moments of an original synthesis. Otherwise we shall immediately meet with this paradox: the past is no longer, the future is not yet, as for the instantaneous present, everyone knows that it is not at all: it is the limit of infinite division, like the dimensionless point. ~ Jean-Paul Sartre

Elements and birthdays have been intertwined for me since boyhood, when I learned about atomic numbers. ~ Oliver Sacks

It is not my fault that certain so-called bohemian elements have found in my writings something to hang their peculiar beatnik theories on. ~ Jack Kerouac

You go from movies where you are wearing nice clothes and you're trying to smell good to a movie where you are in water and you are wet all day, and you are dealing with that elements, it gets rough, but it was definitely something I wanted to try. ~ Morris Chestnut

And yet, troublingly, there is one difference between 'labour' and other elements [raw materials, machinery] which conventional economics does not have a means to represent, or give weight to, but which is nevertheless unavoidably present in the world: the fact that labour feels pain. ~ Alain De Botton