It is much better to be tied to one wonderful thing than to allow a mere catalog of wonderful things to deprive you of the capacity to wonder.
G. K. Chesterton
Of all forms of literature, however, the essay is the one which least calls for the use of long words.
Virginia Woolf
Were we to illuminate the most ordinary, common, and familiar of things, then the greatest miracles of nature and the most marvelous examples, especially concerning human actions, might be formed.
Michel de Montaigne
Others have taken heart to speak of themselves because they found the subject worthy and rich; I, on the contrary, because I have found mine so pointless and so meager that no one could suspect me of ostentation.
Michel de Montaigne
Everything I see or hear is an essay in bud. The world is everywhere whispering essays, and one need only be the world’s amanuensis.
Alexander Smith
[The "light" essay] offers no instruction, save through the medium of enjoyment, and one saunters lazily along with a charming unconsciousness of effort.
Agnes Repplier
The task of the essayist is to collect the fruit of his experience, reflect on it, and set it out for our consideration.
Ian Jack
The world is not so much in need of new thoughts as that when thought grows old and worn with usage it should, like current coin, be called in, and, from the mint of genius, reissued fresh and new.
Alexander Smith
And on the loftiest throne in the world we are still sitting only on our own rump.
Michel de Montaigne
One can tie up all moral philosophy with an ordinary and private life just as easily as with a life of richer stuff: Each person bears the entire form of the human condition.
Michel de Montaigne
As it maps the territory of the self, the essay details the particulars of everyday life…. The wonder is not that art can be made of such ordinary stuff, but that we should expect it to be found anywhere else.
G. Douglas Atkins
As for me … I enjoy living among pedestrians who have an instinctive and habitual realization that there is more to a journey than the mere fact of arrival.
E. B. White
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Quote of the Day

By Christopher Spiker November 12, 2010 - 4:30pm
Christopher Spiker

Phyl­lis Rose, in her es­say “Tools of Tor­ture", takes a can­did look at the dark side of tools, a look that is all the more chilling for ex­pos­ing the his­tor­ic­ally mundane and prag­mat­ic pro­cess of tor­ture – a pro­cess that is not so dif­fer­ent from that of beau­ti­fic­a­tion, like a trip to the spa. The es­say, from her col­lec­tion Nev­er Say Good­bye (1991), is re­prin­ted in The Ped­es­tri­an No. 2, out in Decem­ber. The es­say be­gins:

“In a gal­lery off the rue Dauphine, near the par­fumer­ie where I get my mas­sage, I happened upon an ex­hib­it of me­di­ev­al tor­ture in­stru­ments. It made me think that pain must be as great a chal­lenge to the hu­man ima­gin­a­tion as pleas­ure. Oth­er­wise there’s no ac­count­ing for the num­ber of tor­ture in­stru­ments. One would be quite enough. …”

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