Good Writing

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
page 79

Mrs. Barbour was from a society family with an old Dutch name, so cool and blonde and monotone that sometimes she seemed partially drained of blood. She was a masterpiece of composure; nothing ever ruffled her or made her upset, and though she was not beautiful her calmness had the magnetic pull of beauty -- a stillness so powerful that the molecules realigned themselves around her when she came into a room.

page 476

None of this was as bad as I'd feared. But what I hadn't expected to hit even a quarter so hard was what Mya called "the mental stuff," which was unendurable, a sopping black curtain of horror.

But depression wasn't the word. This was a plunge encompassing sorrow and revulsion far beyond the personal: a sick, drenching nausea at all humanity and human endeavor from the dawn of time.

page 745 -- Boris

Well -- I have to say I personally have never drawn such a sharp line between "good" and "bad" as you. For me: that line is often false. The two are never disconnected. One can't exist without the other. As long as I am acting out of love, I feel I am doing best I knowhow. But you -- wrapped up in judgment, always regretting the past, cursing yourself, blaming yourself, asking "what if," "what if." "Life is cruel." "I wish I had died instead of." Well -- think about this. What if all your actions and choices, good or bad, make no difference to God? What if the pattern is pre-set? No no -- hang on -- this is a question worth struggling with. What if our badness and mistakes are the very thing that set our fate and bring us round to good? What if, for some of us, we can't get there any other way?

page 758 -- Hobie

" ... if a painting really works down in your heart and changes the way you see, and think, and feel, you don't think, "oh, I love this picture because it's universal." "I love this painting because it speaks to all mankind." That's not the reason anyone loves a piece of art. It's a secret whisper from an alleyway. "Psst, you. Hey kid. Yes you."

You see one painting, I see another, the art book puts it another remove still, the lady buying the greeting card at the museum gift shop sees something else entirely, and that's not even to mention the people separated from us by time -- four hundred years before us, four hundred years after we're gone -- it'll never strike anybody the same way and the great majority of people it'll never strike in any deep way at all but -- a really great painting is fluid enough to work its way into the mind and heart through all kinds of different angles, in ways that are unique and very particular.

Candide by Voltaire - Published 1759

page 86

“The Dutch fetishes who converted me tell me every Sunday that the blacks and whites are all children of one father, whom they call Adam. As for me, I do not understand anything of genealogies; but if what these preachers say is true, we are all second cousins; and you must allow that it is impossible to be worse treated by our relations than we are.”

page 154

The little society, one and all, entered into this laudable design and set themselves to exert their different talents. The little piece of ground yielded them a plentiful crop. Cunegund indeed was very ugly, but she became an excellent hand at pastry work: Pacquette emroidered; the old woman had the care of the lilnen. There was non, down to Brother Grioflee, but did some service; he was a very good carpenter, and became an honest man. 

...

"Excellently observed," answered Candide; "but let us cultivate our garden."

The Catcher in the Rye by J. D Salinger

page 205

“It's funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they'll do practically anything you want them to.” 
― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye