Biography Quotes

“After experiencing a past life as a Native American, I remembered what the Indians believed.”
― John-Paul Cernak, The Odyssey of a Hippie Marijuana Grower

“Wallace travelled independently and was challenged every step. He had no government or military support system. He had little cash — he earned enough to survive by sending natural history specimens to his agent in London for sale to collectors and museums. He had visceral moments of excitement when he discovered a beautiful new butterfly or adopted a baby orangutan he had just orphaned by shooting its mother. He lived simply, often in the rainforest on isolated islands, in a manner completely different to the expected behavior of other Western explorers and colonials.”
― Paul Spencer Sochaczewski, "Look Here, Sir, What a Curious Bird": Searching for Ali, Alfred Russel Wallace's Faithful Companion

“Some 5,000 of Wallace’s 8,050 bird specimens he collected during eight years in the Malay Archipelago were actually collected by Ali. None are named after the young man.”
― Paul Spencer Sochaczewski, "Look Here, Sir, What a Curious Bird": Searching for Ali, Alfred Russel Wallace's Faithful Companion

“I wanted Ole Miss to feel special, but mostly I felt that the Ole Miss crowd looked at me like I was just white trash from a town full of trailers.… All was not lost. I saw the movie All The President’s Men, mostly because Robert Redford was the star. The fast-paced world of the Washington Post…captivated me. Sitting in a dark theater that afternoon, I fell in love with the idea of becoming a reporter. That was the movie that clinched my plan to major in journalism and political science…. I'd started Ole Miss as a Lady Rebel but left more rebellious than ladylike.”
― Karen Hinton, Penis Politics: A Memoir of Women, Men and Power

“Driving home, I thought of Janice, wondering why I wasn’t upset or hurt by (William) Styron’s wine-soaked moves. Did I give his flirtations a pass because of the alcohol? Was it because he was a famous and a highly praised writer whom I'd wanted to meet? Or did I need to protect him since he was somebody, and I was nobody? I only knew that I didn’t feel abused, like I knew Janice had been…. Styron was famous. But so was Coach, at least in Soso.”
― Karen Hinton, Penis Politics: A Memoir of Women, Men and Power

“We know quite a bit about Alfred Russel Wallace, one of the great figures of modern science. But we know relatively little about Ali, Wallace’s faithful companion who supported him during much of his eight-year sojourn in the Malay Archipelago in the mid-19th century.”
― Paul Spencer Sochaczewski, "Look Here, Sir, What a Curious Bird": Searching for Ali, Alfred Russel Wallace's Faithful Companion

“I don’t remember anything about the accident that changed my life. All I knew was what seemed like an endless, foggy dream.”
― Karen Hinton, Penis Politics: A Memoir of Women, Men and Power

“Sermons frequently refer to the apostles of Christ as poor, uneducated tradesmen. But three of the Twelve, Matthew, John, and Peter, wrote some of the world’s all-time best-selling literature. The apostles were more than just literate; Jesus called them scribes “who [had] been trained for the kingdom of heaven . . . like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old” (Matt 13:52). It would be surprising if the disciples ignored this and failed to take notes during Jesus’ ministry.”
― James Allen Moseley, Biographies of Jesus' Apostles: Ambassadors in Chains

“Jerome says Peter founded the church in Antioch, Syria. If so, January 15–22, AD 34 was probably the time when Peter did it.”
― James Allen Moseley, Biographies of Jesus' Apostles: Ambassadors in Chains

“I am an ambassador in chains,” wrote Paul in Ephesians 6:20.”
― James Allen Moseley, Biographies of Jesus' Apostles: Ambassadors in Chains

“The blood of Jesus settled the score for us to be a champion in Him, to break the satanic powers of darkness, to stop the destroyer called the devil in his tracks, and for us to recover everything that he has stolen from us that has to do with our purpose and our destiny. Whatever the conqueror and the locust have eaten, God is the restorer of everything.”
― John Ramirez

“Almost every family has their own Christmas traditions (if, indeed, they celebrate Christmas) and we certainly had several. First, the house was thoroughly cleaned and decorated with wreaths and paper chains and, of course, the Christmas tree with all its sparkling lights and ornaments. The cardboard nativity scene had to be carefully assembled and placed on the mantle. And there was the advent wreath with its little windows to be opened each morning. And then there were the Christmas cookies. About a week before the holiday, Mom would bake several batches of the cookies and I invited all my friends to come and help decorate them. It was an “all-afternoon” event. We gathered around our big round dining table with bowls of colored icing and assorted additions—red hot candies, coconut flakes, sugar “glitter,” chocolate chips, and any other little bits we could think of. Then, the decorating began!”
― Mallory M. O'Connor, The Kitchen and the Studio: A Memoir of Food and Art

“I asked Bill what career path he thought I should take, and he replied, “Live the artist’s life.” For years I pondered over his advice. What did it mean to “live the artist’s life?” I finally came to realize that there were no written codes, no hard and fast rules. You didn’t have to starve in a garret or drink yourself to death or cut off your ear. You didn’t even have to literally “make art” physically. The art was your life—your values, your outlook, your passions, your point of view. It was the things you cherished, whether they were people or places or ideas.”
― Mallory M. O'Connor, The Kitchen and the Studio: A Memoir of Food and Art

“If there’s an eighth wonder of the world, I would suggest lavender. Not only is it beautiful to the eye and heavenly to the nose, it also is said to have antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties and research suggests it may be useful in treating anxiety, insomnia, and depression. And it’s a wonderful addition to—ta-da—COOKIES! Mom always kept a large wooden wine barrel filled with lavender next to the back porch so she could grab a handful of lavender flowers whenever the mood struck her. She made lavender sachets to hang in the closets and added lavender to her rose potpourri. We regularly had lavender lemonade or lavender muffins and often some lavender flowers were identifiable in a lamb stew or as a garnish for steaks. All part of our Mediterranean lifestyle.”
― Mallory M. O'Connor

“So, it wasn’t until I was living in Mexico that I first started enjoying chocolate mousse. See, there was this restaurant called La Lorraine that became a favorite of ours when John and I were living in Mexico City in 1964–65. The restaurant was in a beautiful old colonial period house with a large courtyard, red tile floors, and a big black and white portrait of Charles de Gaulle on the wall. The proprietor was a hefty French woman with grey hair swept up in a bun. She always welcomed us warmly and called us mes enfants, “my children.” Her restaurant was very popular with the folks from the German and French embassies located nearby. She wasn’t too keen on the locals. I think she took to us because I practiced my French on her and you know how the French are about their language! At the end of each evening (yeah, we often closed the joint) madame was usually seated at the table next to the kitchen counting up the evening’s receipts. Across from her at the table sat a large French poodle, wearing a napkin bib and enjoying a bowl of onion soup. Ah, those were the days… Oh, and her mousse au chocolate was to DIE for!”
― Mallory M. O'Connor, The Kitchen and the Studio: A Memoir of Food and Art

“Chiudendo la porta sul mondo reale, potremo vivere in pace nel nostro.
Sappiamo che un mondo senza dolore è un mondo senza sentimento... ma un mondo senza sentimento è un mondo senza dolore.”
― Daniel Keyes, The Minds of Billy Milligan

“The world doesn't need more people confining themselves into ever-shrinking containers of what's acceptable, pulling their raw edges in tighter to take up less space. People have these strange rules they create for each other, where they feel everyone must think and feel and act the same way they do. It's scary, letting your freak flag fly, letting the vibrant colors of your soul show in a world that encourages gray conformity. And when you do, some people will absolutely mock you. They will question you and dismiss you and discourage you and even berate and belittle you, your choices somehow a threat to their life even when they in no way affect it.

But some other people, the ones who have niches in their soul that align with yours, won't. Those people will see the streaks of color, those unfurled edges of your personality, and it will encourage them to show and embrace their own. And little by little, this world will become a more beautiful and colorful place, one filled with people running after their dreams, alive with possibility and no longer afraid.”
― Tawny McVay, Since We Woke Up

“Business is an ideal occupation for a Muslim, for a businessman is not a slave to others; he does not always have to succumb to the whims and desires of an employer.”
― علي محمد الصلابي, The Noble Life of the Prophet (Peace be upon him)

“أخذ يقرأ . أثناء قراءته كنت أنثر الزهور و الريحان علي بعض القبور و علي الارض ... كان مدفونا هناك ربما تحت قدمي أو تحت قدمي عبد الملك أو في مكان ما . فجأة فكرت . لكن لماذا هذه القراءة علي قبر أخي المجهول ؟ انه لم يذنب . لم يعش سوى مرضه ثم قتله أبي . تذكرت قول الشيخ الذي دفنه "اخوك الان مع الملائكة " . اخي صار ملاكا و انا ؟ ساكون شيطانا . هذا لا ريب فيه . الصغار اذ ماتو يصيرون ملائكة و الكبار شياطين .
لقد فاتني ان اكون ملاكا”
― محمد شكري, الخبز الحافي

“She was a lifelong romantic, who understood herself well enough to recognise the slipperiness of her grasp on happiness.”
― Matthew Dennison, Behind the Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West

“It struck me then that perhaps the bareness and wrongness of the world was an illusion; that things might still be real, and right, and beautiful, even if I could not see them - that if I stood in the right place, and was lucky this might somehow be revealed to me.”
― Helen Macdonald , H is for Hawk

“He did live a remarkably rich life, and manifested in a number of ways. The introverted London child who’d been moored to a bed for two years with nothing but books for company died as the founder of a worldwide Buddhist movement.”
― Nagabodhi, Sangharakshita: The Boy, the Monk the Man

“She [Dorothy L. Sayers] believed the the artist must serve the work faithfully, but that ultimately, in doing so, he or she was serving Someone higher than the work.”
― Gina Dalfonzo, Dorothy and Jack: The Transforming Friendship of Dorothy L. Sayers and C. S. Lewis

“I believe that a biography is more effectual than any other kind of literature in turning the mind into a new channel, and causing it to take an interest in the concerns of others rather than its own.
GEORGE HAMILTON-GORDON, 5th EARL of ABERDEEN”
― Simon Welfare, Fortune's Many Houses: A Victorian Visionary, a Noble Scottish Family, and a Lost Inheritance

“KPN had set up an office in most countries of the former Eastern bloc. The office in Budapest was in the Buda hills, an area with lush lanes with beautiful large nineteenth-century villas. The minute I saw it, I baptized KPN’s villa ‘Villekulla’, after Pippi Longstocking’s house. I could just picture Pippi leaving the place with Mr. Nilsson on her shoulder, leading her speckled mare down the lane, looking for new adventures. The actual offices were downstairs, with double doors opening out into a large garden with roses and big trees.”
― Ineke Botter, Your phone, my life: Or, how did that phone land in your hand?

“When you're born to a certain kind of mother, you learn very quickly that it is your job to think about death.”
― Catherine Lacey

“In his room, Elvis gave two large red pills, explaining, "Take this now, and by the time you come to bed, you'll be nice and relaxed." I really didn't need anything but he insisted, saying that they would help me sleep better...”
― Priscilla Presley, Elvis and Me: The True Story of the Love Between Priscilla Presley and the King of Rock N' Roll

“Я гнав на своєму сірому скакуні вздовж лінії сутички, а решта наших лежали під укриттям. Можливо, це була дурість, але я граю на високі ставки. Коли ти в бою, кожен вчинок відважний, кожна дія шляхетна".”
― Boris Johnson, The Churchill Factor: How One Man Made History

“Her yıl biraz daha içler acısı bir şekilde çürüyen bir tenin seyrine güçsüz ve altüst olmuş bir şekilde şahitlik ettiğini bildiğimiz Bataille, tene en şiddetli ve en acımasız kaderi biçen metinleri meditasyon diye seçer.”
― Michel Surya, Georges Bataille: An Intellectual Biography

“Sjølvbiografiar skal ein aldri stole på, det er den mest spekulative forma for eventyr”
― Bjørn Hatterud, Blokka på Bjerke. Tretten år i tredje etasje