“Far away like frightened birds, the echo of our feet floated through the upper floors. We climbed three flights of stairs and proceeded the length of another hall. At the end was a door. The Negro opened it.”

—  John Fante , book Ask the Dust

Ask the Dust (1939)

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 "Far away like frightened birds, the echo of our feet floated through the upper floors. We climbed three flights of stai…" by John Fante?
John Fante photo
John Fante 113
1909–1983; American novelist, short story writer and screen… 1909–1983

Related quotes

Fred Astaire photo

“Our homeward step was just as light/As the tap-dancing feet of Astaire/And, like an echo far away,/A nightingale sang in Berkeley Square”

Fred Astaire (1899–1987) American dancer, singer, actor, choreographer and television presenter

from Eric Maschwitz's lyrics to A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square with music by Manning Sherwin

Ayaan Hirsi Ali photo
Otto Lilienthal photo

“The sailing flight of birds is the only form of flight which is carried on for some length of time without the expenditure of power.”

Otto Lilienthal (1848–1896) German aviation pioneer

The Romance of Aeronautics (1912)

Ralph Waldo Emerson photo

“Pass in, pass in, the angels say,
In to the upper doors;
Nor count compartments of the floors,
But mount to Paradise
By the stairway of surprise.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Merlin I http://www.emersoncentral.com/poems/merlin_i.htm, st. 2
1840s, Poems (1847)

T.S. Eliot photo

“Footfalls echo in the memory
down the passage we did not take
towards the door we never opened
into the rose garden. My words echo
thus, in your mind”

Variant: Footfalls echo in the memory, down the passage we did not take, towards the door we never opened, into the rose garden.
Source: Four Quartets

James Thomson (B.V.) photo
Stephen King photo
Douglas Coupland photo
Camille Paglia photo

“The more profound a professor’s distaste with the proceedings, the more likely he is to melt away at the end of the talk.”

Camille Paglia (1947) American writer

On academic conferences, p. 179
Sex, Art and American Culture : New Essays (1992), Junk Bonds and Corporate Raiders : Academe in the Hour of the Wolf
Context: Many, perhaps most, very learned people prefer the company of their books to sitting in a crowd listening to history and art being mangled; furthermore, it is unlikely that the venerable scholars will stand up afterward to declare, “This lecture was a load of crap.” The more profound a professor’s distaste with the proceedings, the more likely he is to melt away at the end of the talk.

Related topics