riftkind’s most recent Quotables

The spirit of the tea beverage is one of peace, comfort and refinement.

Outside of a dog, a book is your best friend, and inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.

A good book is the best of friends, the same today and for ever

There is no mistaking a good book when one meets it. It is like falling in love.

Book lovers will understand me, and they will know too, that part of the pleasure of a library lies in its very existence."

Rainy days should be spent at home with a cup of tea and a good book.

Film is one of the three universal languages, the other two: mathematics and music.

It's no good pretending that any relationship has a future if your record collections disagree violently or if your favourite films wouldn't even speak to each other if they met at a party.

Learning is remembering what you are interested in.

Any darn fool can make something complex; it takes a genius to make something simple.

The truth is seldom welcome, especially at dinner.

I always advise children who ask me for tips on being a writer to read as much as they possibly can. Jane Austen gave a young friend the same advice, so I'm in good company there.

Those who choose not to empathize enable real monsters, for without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves we collude with it through our apathy.

To hurt is as human as to breathe.

Probably the very best thing my earnings have given me is absense of worry. I have not forgotten what it feels like to worry whether you'll have enough to pay the bills. Not to have to think about that any more is the biggest luxury in the world.

To fill the hour—that is happiness.

It's a cruel season that makes you get ready for bed while it's light out. 

Sleeping is no mean art:  for its sake one must stay awake all day.

Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

If you need to tell your readers something... there are only two characters that you can put it convincingly into their dialogue. One is Hermione, the other is Dumbledore. In both cases you accept, it's plausible that they have, well Dumbledore knows pretty much everything anyway, but that Hermione has read it somewhere. So, she's handy.