1840s, Writing Sampler (1844)
The Aran Islands (1907)
“Please don't read the preface for the teacher.”
Grundlagen der Analysis [Foundations of Analysis] (1930) Preface for the Student, as quoted by Eli Maor, Trigonometric Delights (2013)
“Shaw's plays are the price we pay for Shaw’s prefaces.”
Ego, p. 276, March 10, 1933.
“[P]erhaps you notice how the denial is so often the preface to the justification.”
Source: Hitch-22: A Memoir
“Logically speaking, even the life of an actor has no preface. He begins, and that is all.”
Preface
Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving (1907)
Context: Logically speaking, even the life of an actor has no preface. He begins, and that is all. And such beginning is usually obscure; but faintly remembered at the best. Art is a completion; not merely a history of endeavour. It is only when completeness has been obtained that the beginnings of endeavour gain importance, and that the steps by which it has been won assume any shape of permanent interest. After all, the struggle for supremacy is so universal that the matters of hope and difficulty of one person are hardly of general interest. When the individual has won out from the huddle of strife, the means and steps of his succeeding become of interest, either historically or in the educational aspect — but not before. From every life there may be a lesson to some one; but in the teeming millions of humanity such lessons can but seldom have any general or exhaustive force. The mere din of strife is too incessant for any individual sound to carry far. Fame, who rides in higher atmosphere, can alone make her purpose heard. Well did the framers of picturesque idea understand their work when in her hand they put a symbolic trumpet.
“This volume was written for children. Miss Landon set out its purpose in the preface.”
Traits and Trials of Early Life (1836)
Source: On Empire, Liberty, and Reform: Speeches and Letters
“All explicit knowledge is translated knowledge, and all translation is imperfect.”
Source: The Wise Man's Fear
