33 Quotes Tagged: gift

Time, as far as my father was concerned, was a gift you gave to other people.

I never had any doubts about my abilities. I knew I could write. I just had to figure out how to eat while doing this.

[Cormac McCarthy's Venomous Fiction, New York Times, April 19, 1992]

She sang, as requested. There was much about love in the ballad: faithful love that refused to abandon its object; love that disaster could not shake; love that, in calamity, waxed fonder, in poverty clung closer. The words were set to a fine old air — in themselves they were simple and sweet: perhaps, when read, they wanted force; when well sung, they wanted nothing. Shirley sang them well: she breathed into the feeling, softness, she poured round the passion, force: her voice was fine that evening; its expression dramatic: she impressed all, and charmed one.

On leaving the instrument, she went to the fire, and sat down on a seat — semi-stool, semi-cushion: the ladies were round her — none of them spoke. The Misses Sympson and the Misses Nunnely looked upon her, as quiet poultry might look on an egret, an ibis, or any other strange fowl. What made her sing so? They never sang so. Was it proper to sing with such expression, with such originality — so unlike a school girl? Decidedly not: it was strange, it was unusual. What was strange must be wrong; what was unusual must be improper. Shirley was judged.

The gift was not large as money goes, and my need was not great, but the spirit of the gift is beyond price and leaves me blessed and in debt.

A friend is a gift you give yourself.

Any fool that had once helped you will someday make known to everyone that you were once a needy. No matter how broke you are, don't ever be quick to ask for help, let it be voluntary, and you must also learn to feign repudiation, no matter how valuable the offer.

The most essential gift for a good writer is a built-in, shock-proof, shit detector. This is the writer's radar and all great writers have had it.

Its really hard to recall the day you became friends with special people.

To be a well-favoured man is the gift of fortune; but to write and read comes by nature.

Your mind is a book; God is the pen.

Thus heaven's gift to us is this:
That habit takes the place of bliss.

Isn't this the purpose of education, to learn the nature of your own gifts and how to use them for good in the world?

We cannot ignore our gift of the future.

In a garden, food arises from partnership. If I don't pick rocks and pull weeds, I'm not fulfilling my end of the bargain. I can do these thing with my handy opposable thumb and capacity to use tools, to shovel manure. But I can no more create a tomato or embroider a trellis in beans than I can turn lead into gold. That is the plants' responsibility and their gift: animating the inanimate. Now there is a gift.

The excellence of a gift lies in its appropriateness rather than in its
value.