“Pages full of idle words
Penned with hot and bitter tears:
All men call the author fool;
None his secret message hears.”

—  Cao Xueqin, book Dream of the Red Chamber

Source: Dream of the Red Chamber (c. 1760), Chapter 1

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 "Pages full of idle words Penned with hot and bitter tears: All men call the author fool; None his secret message hea…" by Cao Xueqin?
Cao Xueqin photo
Cao Xueqin11
Chinese writer during the Qing dynasty 1724–1763

Related quotes

“Pages full of unlikely words,
Handfuls of hot, bitter tears.
They call the author a silly fool,
For they know not what he means.”

Wang Chi-chen (1899–2001)

Source: Dream of the Red Chamber (1958), p. 4

John Fante photo

“I felt his hot tears and the loneliness of man and the sweetness of all men and the aching haunting beauty of the living”

John Fante book Full of Life

Source: Full of Life

William Johnson Cory photo

“They told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead,
They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed.”

William Johnson Cory (1823–1892) English educator and poet

Poem Heraclitus http://www.bartleby.com/101/759.html.

Cecil Frances Alexander photo

“This was the truest warrior
That ever buckled sword;
This the most gifted poet
That ever breathed a word;
And never earth’s philosopher
Traced with his golden pen
On the deathless page truths half so sage
As he wrote down for men.”

Cecil Frances Alexander (1818–1895) British hymn-writer and poet

Hymn: The Burial of Moses http://www.bethanyipc.org.sg/poems/bulletin080113.htm

Stephen King photo

“The more you read, the less apt you are to make a fool of yourself with your pen or word processor.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

Persius photo

“None, none descends into himself, to find
The secret imperfections of his mind.”
Ut nemo in sese tentat descendere! nemo! Sed praecedenti spectatur mantica tergo.

Persius (34–62) ancient latin poet

Satire IV, line 23 (translated by John Dryden).
The Satires

“Busy opinion is an idle fool.”

John Ford (dramatist) 'Tis Pity She's a Whore

Act V, sc. iii.
'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1629-33?)

Jack Kerouac photo

“The page is long, blank, and full of truth. When I am through with it, it shall probably be long, full, and empty with words.”

Jack Kerouac book Atop an Underwood: Early Stories and Other Writings

Source: Atop an Underwood: Early Stories and Other Writings

Francis Bacon photo

“But words plainly force and overrule the understanding, and throw all into confusion, and lead men away into numberless empty controversies and idle fancies.”

Francis Bacon book Novum Organum

Novum Organum (1620), Book I
Context: There are also Idols formed by the intercourse and association of men with each other, which I call Idols of the Market Place, on account of the commerce and consort of men there. For it is by discourse that men associate, and words are imposed according to the apprehension of the vulgar. And therefore the ill and unfit choice of words wonderfully obstructs the understanding. Nor do the definitions or explanations wherewith in some things learned men are wont to guard and defend themselves, by any means set the matter right. But words plainly force and overrule the understanding, and throw all into confusion, and lead men away into numberless empty controversies and idle fancies.

Aphorism 43

Related topics