This is an announcement for a new feature, a new page on this website: Lines I Love. We all, as readers, have them, lines that make us laugh, reflect, cry; descriptions that make us cringe, pull our knees tightly together in fear and empathy, a visceral reaction to the material being read. Sometimes, in the middle of what might be an otherwise hapless story or thoroughly average novel, the writer weaves a phrase that so delights us, we have to re-read it in momentary praise and condemnation: praise and awe over the beauty of the emotions the author has captured and the way in which he or she said it, and condemnation for the fact that we didn't think of it first.
As this feature (and website) evolves I may include an explanation as to why I love these particular lines or passages. As of now there is no rhyme, no reason, no order. Feel free to visit the page and see what types of writing and phrasing tickles my arbitrary fancy. Feel free to disagree. Feel free to leave comments of some of your own favorite lines. Those submitted will be added to the page, with attribution.
I leave you lines from "The Origin of Love" from the film Hedwig and the Angry Inch. The lyrics near the end of the song, listed below, sums up the intentions of most writers, well, at least my intentions, better than I could ever hope to: to show the pain inside each of our characters (and us) and, hopefully, by showing that pain, to help them (and us) heal:

But I could swear by your expression
that the pain down in your soul
was the same as the one down in mine.
- John Cameron Mitchell, "The Origin of Love"


3/1/2012 07:05:21 pm

Fun idea, Darren!

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3/2/2012 02:51:53 am

Thanks, Kelly. Feel free to submit your own! I'll post them on the page, with full attribution.

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3/2/2012 09:55:25 am

Oooh. I like this! I was having a discussion the other day about how sometimes lines are so memorable that we carry them with us forever. Neat feature.

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3/2/2012 12:12:17 pm

"Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn." (Gone With The Wind)
"What do you think I do, sit around and write letters all day?" (The Jerk)
"We crouched in Marlena's tent, crying and holding onto each other like spider monkeys." (Like Water for Elephants)

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Jen
3/4/2012 07:43:05 am

"Immortality," said Crake, "is a concept. If you take 'mortality' as being, not death, but the foreknowledge of it and the fear of it, then 'immortality' is the absence of such fear. Babies are immortal. Edit out the fear, and you'll be..." Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood

"I'm cold," Snowden said again in a frail, childlike voice. "I'm cold." "There, there," Yossarian said, because he did not know what else to say. "There, there." - Catch 22 Joseph Heller

"Can I meet this other individual as a person who is in the process of "becoming", or will I be bound by his past and by my past" On Becoming a Person - Carl Rogers

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3/10/2012 11:53:32 pm

Thanks, Jen. These quotes have been added to the page.

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