“I hope that famous critics will not class me with certain devotees of death and doom if I say here that I think that funerals in our churchyard gave me more entertainment than most other things when I was a little boy.”

—  Halldór Laxness

Brekkukotsannáll (The Fish Can Sing) (1957)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I hope that famous critics will not class me with certain devotees of death and doom if I say here that I think that fu…" by Halldór Laxness?
Halldór Laxness photo
Halldór Laxness 216
Icelandic author 1902–1998

Related quotes

Suzanne Collins photo

“To this day, I can never shake the connection between this boy, Peeta Mellark, and the bread that gave me hope, and the dandelion that reminded me that I was not doomed.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Source: The Hunger Games

Neil Gaiman photo

“I was a normal child. Which is to say, I was selfish and I was not entirely convinced of the existence of things that were not me, and I was certain, rock-solid unshakably certain, that I was the most important thing in creation. There was nothing that was more important to me than I was.”

Neil Gaiman book The Ocean at the End of the Lane

Source: The Ocean at the End of the Lane (2013), Chapter 14 (p. 207)

Albrecht Thaer photo

“My mother, as much as I can remember from my early boyhood, and from what I heard of her after her death, was of a most lively temper, and possessed of a good and noble heart, but a little inclined to sensibility; her greatest pleasure was to see everyone happy about her. She loved me dearly and spoilt me. I adored her. Alas, I lost her when only a little boy, and never shall I efface from my memory the day of her death and funeral.”

Albrecht Thaer (1752–1828) German agronomist and an avid supporter of the humus theory for plant nutrition

My Life and Confessions, for Philippine, 1786

Thomas Wolfe photo

“I think the true discovery of America is before us. I think the true fulfillment of our spirit, of our people, of our mighty and immortal land, is yet to come. I think the true discovery of our own democracy is still before us. And I think that all these things are certain as the morning, as inevitable as noon. I think I speak for most men living when I say that our America is Here, is Now, and beckons on before us, and that this glorious assurance is not only our living hope, but our dream to be accomplished.”

Thomas Wolfe book You Can't Go Home Again

Book VII, Ch. 48: Credo
You Can't Go Home Again (1940)

“But I think the most important thing those books gave me was a kind of faith. My books promised me that life wasn’t just made up of workaday tasks and prosaic things. The world is bigger and more colorful and more important than that.”

Laura Amy Schlitz (1955) children's author

Source: The Hired Girl

Sai Baba of Shirdi photo

“Though I be no more in flesh and blood, I shall ever protect my devotees. I shall be with you the moment you think of me.”

Sai Baba of Shirdi (1836–1918) Hindu and muslim saint

Saying stated to his disciples

Samuel Butler photo

“I doubt whether any angel would find me very entertaining. As for myself, if ever I do entertain one it will have to be unawares. When people entertain others without an introduction they generally turn out more like devils than angels.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Entertaining Angels
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part X - The Position of a HomoUnius Libri

Abraham Lincoln photo

“[W]orking men are the basis of all governments. That remark is due to them more than to any other class, for the reason that there are more of them than of any other class. And as your address is presented to me not only on behalf of workingmen, but especially of Germans, I may say a word as to classes. I hold the value of life is to improve one's condition. Whatever is calculated to advance the condition of the honest, struggling laboring man, so far as my judgment will enable me to judge of a correct thing. I am for that thing.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

1860s, Speech to Germans at Cincinnati, Ohio (1861), Gazette version

“When I was a little girl (but being raised as a little boy), what I wanted more than anything was to be a dancer. How I longed for it — the lights, the stage, the gorgeous costumes, most of all for the delivering grace of movement in harmony with a choreography greater than myself. Like a little Chinese and two left feet saw to that: I was laughed, bullied, or shamed out of every dance class I attempted.”

Kai Cheng Thom (1991) writer

What I learned, loved and lost as a trans Zumba addict (2018)

Isaac Bashevis Singer photo

“When I was a little boy, they called me a liar, but now that I am grown up, they call me a writer.”

Isaac Bashevis Singer (1902–1991) Polish-born Jewish-American author

TIME (18 July 1983)

Related topics