Quotes about fisting (232 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“I choose gentleness… Nothing is won by force. I choose to be gentle. If I raise my voice may it be only in praise. If I clench my fist, may it be only in prayer. If I make a demand, may it be only of myself.”

Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer

“We will outstretch the hand if you unclench your fist.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

“You can't shake hands with a clenched fist.”

Indíra Gándhí (1917–1984) Indian politician and Prime Minister

Attributed
Variant: You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.

“And she was mine, she was mine, the key was in my fist, my fist was in my pocket, she was mine.”

Vladimir Nabokov book Lolita

Source: Lolita

“You just hold your head high and keep those fists down. No matter what anybody says to you, don't you let 'em get your goat. Try fightin' with your head for a change.
-Atticus Finch”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

Change

“What have you done?' he said, his voice hollow and strained. He stepped back and put his fists to his temples. 'What have you done!'
With an effort, Eragon said, 'Made you understand.”

Christopher Paolini book Inheritance

Source: Inheritance

Understanding , Effort

“I believe in using words, not fists… I believe in my outrage knowing people are living in boxes on the street. I believe in honesty. I believe in a good time. I believe in good food. I believe in sex.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

No known source; also attributed to Susan Sarandon.[citation needed]
Disputed

People , Food , Sex , Time

“I knew it!" He pumps a fist into the air. "You've fallen in love with me. You want to have my babies. We'll get a team of horses and a covered wagon and we'll journey to South America and raise goats.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Wintergirls

Source: Wintergirls

Love , Horse , Baby

“If God is dead, somebody is going to have to take his place. It will be megalomania or erotomania, the drive for power or the drive for pleasure, the clenched fist or the phallus, Hitler or Hugh Hefner.”

Malcolm Muggeridge (1903–1990) English journalist, author, media personality, and satirist

God , Pleasure , Dead

“Hynkel, the dictator, ruled the nation with an iron fist. Under the new emblem of the double cross, liberty was banished, free speech was suppressed and only the voice of Hynkel was heard.”

Charlie Chaplin (1889–1977) British comic actor and filmmaker

Narrator
The Great Dictator (1940)

“Have you ever fed a lover
With just your hands?
Close your eyes and trust it, just trust it.
Have you ever thrown
A fist full of glitter in the air?
Have you ever looked fear in the face,
And said I just don't care?”

Pink (singer) (1979) American singer-songwriter

Glitter in the Air, written by Pink, Billy Mann and Michele Mears
Song lyrics, Funhouse (2008)

Fear , Lovers

“No man can think clearly when his fists are clenched.”

George Jean Nathan (1882–1958) American drama critic and magazine editor

" Undeveloped Notes http://books.google.com/books?id=xIEcAAAAIAAJ&q=%22No+man+can+think+clearly+when+his+fists+are+clenched%22&pg=PA137#v=onepage," The Smart Set (August 1922)
The World in Falseface http://books.google.com/books?id=7rlEAAAAIAAJ&q=%22No+man+can+think+clearly+when+his+fists+are+clenched%22&pg=PA21#v=onepage (1923)

Thinking

“You hit somebody with your fist and not with your fingers spread.”

Heinz Guderian (1888–1954) German general

Man schlägt jemanden mit der Faust und nicht mit gespreizten Fingern.
As quoted in Die Deutschen gepanzerten Truppen bis 1945 (1965) by Oskar Munzel, p. 209; this indicated the need to concentrate tank forces for one strong push in one direction and not distribute them over a large area.

“For decades, this vision stood in sharp contrast to life on the other side of an Iron Curtain. For decades, a contest was waged, and ultimately that contest was won -- not by tanks or missiles, but because our ideals stirred the hearts of Hungarians who sparked a revolution; Poles in their shipyards who stood in Solidarity; Czechs who waged a Velvet Revolution without firing a shot; and East Berliners who marched past the guards and finally tore down that wall. Today, what would have seemed impossible in the trenches of Flanders, the rubble of Berlin, or a dissident’s prison cell -- that reality is taken for granted. A Germany unified. The nations of Central and Eastern Europe welcomed into the family of democracies. Here in this country, once the battleground of Europe, we meet in the hub of a Union that brings together age-old adversaries in peace and cooperation. The people of Europe, hundreds of millions of citizens -- east, west, north, south -- are more secure and more prosperous because we stood together for the ideals we share. And this story of human progress was by no means limited to Europe. Indeed, the ideals that came to define our alliance also inspired movements across the globe among those very people, ironically, who had too often been denied their full rights by Western powers. After the Second World War, people from Africa to India threw off the yoke of colonialism to secure their independence. In the United States, citizens took freedom rides and endured beatings to put an end to segregation and to secure their civil rights. As the Iron Curtain fell here in Europe, the iron fist of apartheid was unclenched, and Nelson Mandela emerged upright, proud, from prison to lead a multiracial democracy. Latin American nations rejected dictatorship and built new democracies, and Asian nations showed that development and democracy could go hand in hand.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2014, Address to European Youth (March 2014)

Life , War , People , Age

“I dream of a language whose words, like fists, would fracture jaws.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

The New Gods (1969)

Dreams

“It is just as ridiculous to get excited & hysterical over a coming cultural change as to get excited & hysterical over one's physical aging... There is legitimate pathos about both processes; but blame & rebellion are essentially cheap, because inappropriate, emotions... It is wholly appropriate to feel a deep sadness at the coming of unknown things & the departure of those around which all our symbolic associations are entwined. All life is fundamentally & inextricably sad, with the perpetual snatching away of all the chance combinations of image & vista & mood that we become attached to, & the perpetual encroachment of the shadow of decay upon illusions of expansion & liberation which buoyed us up & spurred us on in youth. That is why I consider all jauntiness, & many forms of carelessly generalised humour, as essentially cheap & mocking, & occasionally ghastly & corpselike. Jauntiness & non-ironic humour in this world of basic & inescapable sadness are like the hysterical dances that a madman might execute on the grave of all his hopes. But if, at one extreme, intellectual poses of spurious happiness be cheap & disgusting; so at the other extreme are all gestures & fist-clenchings of rebellion equally silly & inappropriate—if not quite so overtly repulsive. All these things are ridiculous & contemptible because they are not legitimately applicable... The sole sensible way to face the cosmos & its essential sadness (an adumbration of true tragedy which no destruction of values can touch) is with manly resignation—eyes open to the real facts of perpetual frustration, & mind & sense alert to catch what little pleasure there is to be caught during one's brief instant of existence. Once we know, as a matter of course, how nature inescapably sets our freedom-adventure-expansion desires, & our symbol-&-experience-affections, definitely beyond all zones of possible fulfilment, we are in a sense fortified in advance, & able to endure the ordeal of consciousness with considerable equanimity... Life, if well filled with distracting images & activities favourable to the ego's sense of expansion, freedom, & adventurous expectancy, can be very far from gloomy—& the best way to achieve this condition is to get rid of the unnatural conceptions which make conscious evils out of impersonal and inevitable limitations... get rid of these, & of those false & unattainable standards which breed misery & mockery through their beckoning emptiness.”

H.P. Lovecraft (1890–1937) American author

Letter to Frank Belknap Long (27 February 1931), in Selected Letters III, 1929-1931 edited by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei, p. 291
Non-Fiction, Letters, to Frank Belknap Long

Life , Pleasure , Youth , Age

“"Men must not awake," the shining shadow goes on, in dull and hollow tones.
"Don't worry!" says the ironical voice, and at that moment it terrifies me.
Several bodies arise on their fists into the darkness — I see them by their heavy groans — and look around them.
The shadow talks to himself and repeats his insane words: —
"Men must not awake."
The voice opposite me, capsizing in laughter and swollen with a rattle, says again: —
"Don't worry!"”

Henri Barbusse (1873–1935) French novelist

Light (1919), Ch. XIV - The Ruins

Men , Laughter

“I feel an army in my fist.”

Friedrich Schiller The Robbers

Die Räuber (The Robbers), Act II (1781)

Feeling

“And clenching your fist for the ones like us who are oppressed by the figures of beauty, you fixed yourself, you said, "Well never mind, we are ugly but we have the music."”

Leonard Cohen (1934–2016) Canadian poet and singer-songwriter

"Chelsea Hotel #2"
Other Lyrics

Beauty , Music

“India wants to avoid a war at all costs but it is not a one-sided affair, you cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.”

Indíra Gándhí (1917–1984) Indian politician and Prime Minister

Press conference, New Delhi (October 19, 1971), quoted in "Indian and Pakistani Armies Confront Each Other Along Borders" by Sydney H. Schanberg, The New York Times (October 20, 1971), page 6C.

War

“I'm currently double fisting a vanilla latte and a dirty chai. I've never had coffee before so this should be interesting. Good morning?”

Chris Colfer (1990) actor, singer, book author

Personal Quotes 2009–2012

Coffee

“The black fist is a meaningless symbol. When you open it, you have nothing but fingers — weak, empty fingers. The only time the black fist has significance is when there's money inside. There's where the power lies.”

Jesse Owens (1913–1980) American track and field athlete

Said to Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who had given the black power salute while receiving their Olympic medals
Jesse Owens, Champion Athlete (1990)

Money , Time

“I think these things [firearms] were invented by Satan himself, for they can’t be defended against with (ordinary) weapons and fists. All human strength vanishes when confronted with firearms. A man is dead before he sees what’s coming.”

Martin Luther book Table Talk

3552
Table Talk (1569)

Thinking , Dead

“I define speech as any communicative activity. [Can it be nonverbal? ] Yes. [Can it be nonverbal and also not written? ] Yes. [Can it encompass physical actions? ] Yes. Watt [Community for Creative Non-Violence v. Watt, 703 F.2d 586 (1983)] was a case in which what was at issue was sleeping as communicative activity. What I said was that for purposes of the heightened protections that are accorded, sleeping could not be speech. That is to say, I did not say that one could prohibit sleeping merely for the purpose of eliminating the communicative aspect of sleeping, if there is any... [and] I did not say that the Government could seek to prohibit that communication without running afoul of the heightened standards of the first amendment. If they passed a law that allows all other sleeping but only prohibits sleeping where it is intended to communicate, then it would be invalidated. But what I did say was, where you have a general law that just applies to an activity which in itself is normally not communicative, such as sleeping, spitting, whatever you like; clenching your fist, for example; such a law would not be subject to the heightened standards of the first amendment. That is to say, if there is ordinary justification for it, it is fine. It does not have to meet the high need, the no other available alternative requirements of the first amendment. Whereas, when you are dealing with communicative activity, naturally communicative activity—writing, speech, and so forth— any law, even if it is general, across the board, has to meet those higher standards.”

Antonin Scalia (1936–2016) former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings, (8/5/1986), transcript https://web.archive.org/web/20060213232846/http://a255.g.akamaitech.net/7/255/2422/22sep20051120/www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/senate/judiciary/sh99-1064/31-110.pdf at pp. 51-52).
1980s

Law , Communication , Nature , Sleep

“We hold each other’s lives in our open hands, not in clenched fists.”

Lloyd Alexander The Chronicles of Prydain

Source: The Chronicles of Prydain (1964–1968), Book II: The Black Cauldron (1965), Chapter 2

“To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2009, First Inaugural Address (January 2009)

People , History , Silence

“Socialists cry "Power to the people", and raise the clenched fist as they say it. We all know what they really mean—power over people, power to the State.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Conservative Central Council (15 March 1986) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=106348
Second term as Prime Minister
Context: Popular capitalism, which is the economic expression of liberty, is proving a much more attractive means for diffusing power in our society. Socialists cry "Power to the people", and raise the clenched fist as they say it. We all know what they really mean— power over people, power to the State. To us Conservatives, popular capitalism means what it says: power through ownership to the man and woman in the street, given confidently with an open hand.

People , Cry

“There are five fundamental qualities that make every team great: communication, trust, collective responsobility, caring and pride. I like to think of each as separate finger on the fist.”

Mike Krzyzewski (1947) American basketball player and coach

Communication , Thinking

“Gentlemen! I too have been a close observer of the doings of the Bank of the United States. I have had men watching you for a long time, and am convinced that you have used the funds of the bank to speculate in the breadstuffs of the country. When you won, you divided the profits amongst you, and when you lost, you charged it to the bank. You tell me that if I take the deposits from the bank and annul its charter I shall ruin ten thousand families. That may be true, gentlemen, but that is your sin! Should I let you go on, you will ruin fifty thousand families, and that would be my sin! You are a den of vipers and thieves. I have determined to rout you out, and by the Eternal, (bringing his fist down on the table) I will rout you out!”

Andrew Jackson (1767–1845) American general and politician, 7th president of the United States

Reputedly from the original minutes of the Philadelphia committee of citizens sent to meet with President Jackson (February 1834), according to Andrew Jackson and the Bank of the United States (1928) by Stan V. Henkels as published by his son Stan V. Henkels Jr. - online PDF http://kenhirsch.net/money/AndrewJacksonAndTheBankHenkels.pdf. John Carney at Business Insider https://www.businessinsider.com/sorry-andrew-jackson-probably-never-said-that-den-of-theives-quote-2010-1 has disputed its authenticity alleging Henkels made unreliable claims about historical documents.
A different version of this quote is provided by Henkels in a 1912 copy of Publisher's Weekly https://books.google.com/books?id=IyYzAQAAMAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false (p. 2039).
Disputed

Family , Time , Men , Country

“A rose trapped inside a fist.”

Henry Rollins (1961) American singer-songwriter

Source: The Portable Henry Rollins

“Your heart is a weapon the size of your fist. “God”

Cassandra Clare book Lady Midnight

Source: Lady Midnight

God , Heart

“Ah, Fist, it’s the curse of history that those who should read them, never do.”

Steven Erikson book Deadhouse Gates

Source: Deadhouse Gates

History , Reading

“One hand, five homes. A lifetime in a fist.”

Jhumpa Lahiri book The Namesake

Source: The Namesake

Home

“Lucern felt himself "She called my erections wonderful?"
Entienne just gaped, then raised a fist to knock on his brother's forehead as if it were a door "Hello! Earth calling Luc! She thinks it's rigor mortis.”

Lynsay Sands Canadian writer

Source: Single White Vampire

Thinking

“In a world that lives like a fist
mercy is not more than waking
with your hands open.”

Mark Nepo (1951) American writer

World

“You know, if you have certain frustrations," Ascanio said, "I would be happy to help you work them out."
Derek looked at me, pointed at Ascanio, and punched his left palm with his right fist a few times. I shook my head.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Breaks

Time , Help , Happiness

“Hell’s bells. I don’t call him the Fist of God as a pet name, folks.”

Jim Butcher Small Favor

Source: Small Favor

God , Hell

“You're a pretty cool customer, huh?" says Agent Hunt.

"I hide my inner pain under my stoic visage."

Agent Hunt looks like he would like to put his fist through my stoic visage.”

Holly Black book Red Glove

Source: Red Glove

Pain

“I kept having dreams all night. I thought they were touching me with their fingers. But dreams don't have fingers, they have fists, so it must have been scorpions.”

Roberto Bolaño book The Savage Detectives

Source: The Savage Detectives

Dreams , Night

“It’s a small story really, about, among other things:

* A girl
* Some words
* An accordionist
* Some fanatical Germans
* A Jewish fist fighter
* And quite a lot of thievery”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Girl

“Sometimes it made her want to put her fist through glass; other times, it made her cry a river.”

Jodi Picoult Salem Falls

Source: Salem Falls

Time , Cry

“The freedom to swing your fist ends at my nose.”

Mercedes Lackey (1950) American novelist and short story writer

Source: Sacred Ground

Freedom

“His fists clenched at his sides. 'Damn it! Where's your pride?'
'Pride? It's in my heart, of course.'
'You're letting me demean you!'
She smiled. 'You can't do that. I can only demean myself.”

Susan Elizabeth Phillips (1948) American writer

Source: Kiss an Angel

Smile , Heart

“The moment we decide to throw more energy into fighting for our mate than with him, the crack of a fist on the enemy's jaw splits the ears of angels.”

Beth Moore (1957) American evangelist

Angels , Fight

“Why won't you drown?" he wailed, pummeling me with his fists.
"I'm Poseidon's son," I said.
"Curse that upstart! I was here first!”

Rick Riordan book The Titan's Curse

Source: The Titan's Curse

“I love you. I love you,
but I’m turning to my verses
and my heart is closing
like a fist.”

Frank O'Hara book Meditations in an Emergency (book)

Source: Meditations in an Emergency

Love , Heart

“Hours later the blank sheet still stared at me, and I beat my fist against the desk in fury and fustration, striking it so hard my hand bled. That is how heavy a secret can become. It can make blood flow easier than ink.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Wise Man's Fear

Source: The Wise Man's Fear

Secret

“I like autumn. The drama of it; the golden lion roaring through the back door of the year, shaking its mane of leaves. A dangerous time; of violent rages and deceptive calm, of fireworks in the pockets and conkers in the fist.”

Joanne Harris (1964) British author

Source: Gentlemen and Players

Autumn , Rage , Time

“It's hard to let go anything we love. We live in a world which teaches us to clutch. But when we clutch we're left with a fistful of ashes.”

Madeleine L'Engle A Ring of Endless Light

Source: A Ring of Endless Light

Love , World

“When death captures me," the boy vowed, "he will feel my fist in his face." (31.26)”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Death , Feeling , Boy

“The other package has pieces of dried stag stick. The pups like chewing on those."

"What's a stag stick?" Meg asked, taking the packages.

He stared at her for a moment. Then he put a fist below his belt and popped out a thumb.

"Oh," Meg said. ".”

Anne Bishop book Written in Red

Source: Written in Red

“Shura, I’m yours. You may not like it today, you may not want it tonight, you may wish for it all to be different now, but it remains, and I remain, as always, only yours. Nothing can change that. Not your wrath, your fists, your body or your death.”

Paullina Simons book Tatiana and Alexander

Source: Tatiana and Alexander

Death , Change

“I know that when he has sex he laughs like the world is a perfect place. And when he did that, my hands curled into fists because I thought about touching his face like maybe I could catch joy in my hands and hold it.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Iced

World , Sex , Joy , Perfection

“There's a time for reciting poems and a time for fists. As far as I was concerned, this was the latter.”

Roberto Bolaño book The Savage Detectives

Variant: There is a time for reciting poems and a time for fists.
Source: The Savage Detectives

Time

“Roza." his voice had that same wonderful lowness, the same accent… it was all just colder. "You forgot my first lesson: Don't hesitate."
I just barely saw his fist striking out toward my head… and then I saw nothing at all.”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Source: Last Sacrifice

“Yeah, you were doing a real bang-up job of it. I particularly liked the way you were bruising his fists with your face. A few minutes more and I’m sure your heart would have been on the attack… after it was ripped from your chest. (Kat)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Devil May Cry

Way , Heart

“Fight your battles with words, not fists”

Ann M. Martin (1955) American writer of children's literature

Fight

“Wait!" he yelled.
I didn't turn around, I walked faster. Then I heard him slam his fist on the hood of his car. I almost stopped.
Maybe I would have if he'd followed me. But he didn't. He got in his car and he left, just like he said he would.”

Jenny Han (1980) American writer

Source: It's Not Summer Without You

Cars , Waiting

Ally Carter (1974) American writer

Source: United We Spy

Hurt

“what was fang going to do BLOG about max throwing herself into space so she wouldn't have to kiss him again? NO instead he smashed his fist against the cave wall then grimaced at the pain and stupidity seeing his bloodied knuckles”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports

Pain , Stupidity , Kiss

“Emma turned to him, bottom lip trembling. “For me?”
“Always for you. All things for you. He coughed into his fist “All your own.”

Kresley Cole book A Hunger Like No Other

Source: A Hunger Like No Other

“Time for bed.” I held my fist out. One by one, my flock stacked theirs on top, and then we headed up into the trees to sleep the sleep of the innocent. Well, okay, maybe not so innocent. But the sleep of the much less guilty than others, for sure.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: The Final Warning

Sleep , Tree , Time

“I hammered him with my fists. He just stood and took it. He didn't suffer graciously, he looked pissed off to no end. But he let me hit him. And he didn't hit me back.”

Karen Marie Moning book Darkfever

Source: Darkfever

Suffering

“Think of yourselves as a hand. Each of you is a finger, and without the others you're useless. Alone, a finger can't grasp, or control, or form a fist. You are nothing on your own, and everything together.”

Karen Traviss British science fiction author

Thinking

“Why'd you want to sing about sad things?" Candy had asked him.
"Because any fool can be happy," he'd said to her.
"It takes a man with real heart"
—he'd made a fist and laid it against his chest—
"to make beauty out of the stuff that makes us weep.”

Clive Barker Days of Magic, Nights of War

Source: Days of Magic, Nights of War

Sadness , Beauty , Fools , Singing

“Your heart is the size of your fist; keep loving, keep fighting.”

Ariel Gore (1970) American writer

Source: Atlas of the Human Heart

Love , Heart , Fight

“When death captures me,' the boy vowed, 'he will feel my fist on his face.'

Personally, I quite like that. Such stupid gallantry.

Yes.

I like that a lot.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Death , Stupidity , Feeling , Boy

“Just be patient, she told herself, and with the mounting pages, the strength of her writing fist grew.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

“Not being the sort to throw a book, she pounded her fist on her cushion.”

Ellen Kushner (1955) American writer

Books

“Tiny," Sanya rumbled to Michael, clenching a demonstrative fist. "But.”

Jim Butcher Small Favor

Source: Small Favor

“A bud is a flower-to-be. A flower in waiting. Waiting for just the right warmth and care to open up. It's a little fist of love waiting to unfold and be seen by the world. And that's you.”

Christopher Paul Curtis book Bud, Not Buddy

Source: Bud, Not Buddy

Love , World , Flowers , Waiting

“[Roland] jerked back too fast to see, and his fist was suddenly connecting with my chin. I didn't pass out, but my body went limp. Part of me was screaming silently. The other part was saying, 'Oh, what pretty trees.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book Blue Moon

Source: Blue Moon

Jerk , Tree , Parting

“Love, after all, was universal. Qhuinn closed his fist up tight, and knew he would never, ever take that ring off. “Always,” Blay murmured. “Because family is an always kind of thing.”

Jessica Bird (1969) U.S. novelist

Source: Lover at Last

Love , Family , Universe

“He caught her by the wrist, brought her hand to his bare chest. Splayed her fingers over his heart. It beat against her palm, like a fist punching its way through his sternum. 'Break my heart,' he said. 'Break it in pieces. I give you permission.”

Cassandra Clare book Lord of Shadows

Source: Lord of Shadows

Way , Heart

“She didn't flirt with him, but they hung out together a lot, and every time I saw their heads bent over a computer screen or map, it made my stomach clench. And my teeth. And my fists.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Source: The Final Warning

Time

“In joined hands there is still some token of hope, in the clinched fist none.”

Victor Hugo (1802–1885) French poet, novelist, and dramatist

Source: The Toilers of the Sea

Hope , Hope

“I am miracle ingredient Z-247. I'm immense. I'm a real, slam-bang, honest-to-goodness, three-fisted humdinger. I'm a bona fide supraman.”

Joseph Heller book Catch-22

Source: Catch 22

“If the book we are reading does not wake us, as with a fist hammering on our skull, why then do we read it?”

Franz Kafka (1883–1924) author

Books , Reading

“« He squeezed his hands into fists. I picked up a grapefruit-sized rock and handed it to him. It went flying. Home run, Beast Lord style.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Rises

Home , Flying

“Diplomacy is the velvet glove that cloaks the fist of power.”

Robin Hobb (1952) American fiction writer (pseudonym)

“Corporate types love to pretend their life is exciting. The whispers, fist-pumping and animated hand gestures are all designed to lift our job description from what it really is - that of an overpaid clerk”

Chetan Bhagat book 2 States: The Story of My Marriage

Source: 2 States: The Story of My Marriage

Love , Life , Animals

“Like is an emotion. Emotions”—he raised a hand, made a fist, clenched it tightly—“are like holding water. You open your hand, there’s nothing there. Better to be a weapon than a woman.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Water

“I wanted to wipe the grin off his face with a fist. I resisted the urge. Who says I have no self-control?”

Laurell K. Hamilton (1963) Novelist

“Shake your fist all you want but dead is dead.”

Steven Erikson book Gardens of the Moon

Source: Gardens of the Moon

Dead

“You two. You can do a cleaning spell."
One slurred, "But Nixie, I'm really pre-hung-over."
Nix's eyes went wide. "Do it, or the photos go live!"
The witch shook her fist to the sky, crying, "Damn you, Valkyrie! Damn you and your digital ways!”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Kiss of a Demon King

Way , Photo , Cry

“Entropy shakes its angry fist at you for being clever enough to organize the world. (p 2)”

Brandon Sanderson book Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia

Source: Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia

World

“nix: "Do it, or the pictures go live!"

Witch shakes her fist at the sky, crying, "Damn you, Valkyrie! Damn you and your digital ways!”

Kresley Cole American writer

Source: Kiss of a Demon King

Way , Cry

“At moments when life is at its worst there are two things you can do:
1.) break down, lose hope and refuse to go on while lying face down on the ground banging your fists and kicking your legs, or 2.) laugh. Bobby and I did the latter.”

Cecelia Ahern book A Place Called Here

Variant: At moments when life is at its worst there are two things that you can
do: 1) break down, lose hope, and refuse to go on while lying facedown on the ground
banging your fists and kicking your legs, or 2) laugh.
Source: A Place Called Here

Life , Hope , Lying

“Jace,” she said. “Why are you doing this to me?”

“Because you’re lying to me. And you’re lying to yourself.” Jace’s eyes were blazing, and even though his hands were stuffed into his pockets, she could see that they were knotted into fists.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

Lying

“If only she could have held on to that day, held on to that moment forever, grasped it in her fists so it wouldn't escape.
If only.”

Patricia Reilly Giff (1935) American children's writer

Source: Water Street (2006), Chapters 1-10, p. 11

“If you hold two arms out in front of you and someone grabs them, then you can use the third set elbow movement to escape. Bring the hand right in to touch the body. If the hand is held in a fist, it doesn't work. Then press down with the elbow.”

Wong Shun Leung (1935–1997) martial artist

Wong Shun Leung Comments on How to Respond to a Grab
Standing Grappling Situations
Source: Comments From Wong Shun Leung and Tsui Shan Ting, by Ray Van Raamsdonk http://www.springtimesong.com/wcqanda.htm

“This tower, patched unevenly with black ivy, arose like a mutilated finger from among the fists of knuckled masonry and pointed blasphemously at heaven.”

Mervyn Peake book Titus Groan

Source: Titus Groan (1946), Chapter 1 “The Hall of the Bright Carvings” (p. 9)

“Surely it is not every one who is chosen to combat a religion or a morality of two thousand years’ standing, fist within and then without himself.”

Oscar Levy (1867–1946) German physician and writer

Editorial Note, Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (1909), vol. 1, p. ix.

Religion

“Jonathan Ross: Good to see you - how's it hanging?
Julian Clary: Oh, very well thank you. Very nice of you to recreate Hampstead Heath for me here [laughter]. As a matter of fact, I've just been fisting Norman Lamont … [prolonged laughter]
Ross: Let me ask you Julian …
Clary: Talk about a red box.”

Norman Lamont (1942) British politician

Offthetelly.co.uk http://www.offthetelly.co.uk/comedy/comedyawards.htm dead link
Comedian Julian Clary at the British Comedy Awards, 12 December 1993. Lamont had earlier presented one of the awards. Although received in uproarious laughter on the night, Clary's remark (televised live) was heavily criticised in the press and derailed his career.
About

Laughter , Box

““Do you actually hope to convert the whole of mankind?”
“Belay that! Anyhow, if you mean, Do we hope to make everybody into copies of us? The answer is, No. Mind, I’m not in Parliament or Admiralty, but I follow debates and I read the philosophers. One trouble with the old machine culture was that, by its nature, it did force people to become more and more alike. Not only did this fail in the end—disastrously—but to the extent it succeeded, it was a worse disaster.” Lohannaso smote the rail with a mighty fist. “Damnation, Thomas! We need all the diversity, all the assorted ways of living and looking and thinking, we can get!””

Poul Anderson book There Will Be Time

Source: There Will Be Time (1972), Chapter 11 (p. 119)

People , Hope , Way , Nature

“O Warden, I surender to you,
Your fists cain't hurt me anymore,
You know, these hands will never wash,
These dirty Death Row floors.”

Nick Cave (1957) Australian musician

Song lyrics, The Firstborn Is Dead (1985), Knockin' on Joe

Death , Hurt

“The first night, a rock, big as two fists.
The second, a rock big as three.
But nary a curse cursed Rudolph Reed.
(Though oaken as man could be.)
The third night, a silvery ring of glass.
Patience arched to endure,
But he looked, and lo! small Mabel's blood
Was staining her gaze so pure.”

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917–2000) American writer

The Ballad of Rudolph Reed

Patience , Night

“In Somalia, we know exactly what they had to gain because they told us. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Colin Powell, described this as the best public relations operation of the Pentagon that he could imagine. His picture, which I think is plausible, is that there was a problem about raising the Pentagon budget, and they needed something that would be, look like a kind of a cakewalk, which would give a lot of prestige to the Pentagon. Somalia looked easy. Let's look back at the background. For years, the United States had supported a really brutal dictator, who had just devastated the country, and was finally kicked out. After he's kicked out, it was 1990, the country sank into total chaos and disaster, with starvation and warfare and all kind of horrible misery. The United States refused to, certainly to pay reparations, but even to look. By the middle of 1992, it was beginning to ease. The fighting was dying down, food supplies were beginning to get in, the Red Cross was getting in, roughly 80% of their supplies they said. There was a harvest on the way. It looked like it was finally sort of settling down. At that point, all of a sudden, George Bush announced that he had been watching these heartbreaking pictures on television, on Thanksgiving, and we had to do something, we had to send in humanitarian aid. The Marines landed, in a landing which was so comical, that even the media couldn't keep a straight face. Take a look at the reports of the landing of the Marines, it must've been the first week of December 1992. They had planned a night, there was nothing that was going on, but they planned a night landing, so you could show off all the fancy new night vision equipment and so on. Of course they had called the television stations, because what's the point of a PR operation for the Pentagon if there's no one to look for it. So the television stations were all there, with their bright lights and that sort of thing, and as the Marines were coming ashore they were blinded by the television light. So they had to send people out to get the cameramen to turn off the lights, so they could land with their fancy new equipment. As I say, even the media could not keep a straight face on this one, and they reported it pretty accurately. Also reported the PR aspect. Well the idea was, you could get some nice shots of Marine colonels handing out peanut butter sandwiches to starving refugees, and that'd all look great. And so it looked for a couple of weeks, until things started to get unpleasant. As things started to get unpleasant, the United States responded with what's called the Powell Doctrine. The United States has an unusual military doctrine, it's one of the reasons why the U. S. is generally disqualified from peace keeping operations that involve civilians, again, this has to do with sovereignty. U. S. military doctrine is that U. S. soldiers are not permitted to come under any threat. That's not true for other countries. So countries like, say, Canada, the Fiji Islands, Pakistan, Norway, their soldiers are coming under threat all the time. The peace keepers in southern Lebanon for example, are being attacked by Israeli soldiers all the time, and have suffered plenty of casualties, and they don't like it. But U. S. soldiers are not permitted to come under any threat, so when Somali teenagers started shaking fists at them, and more, they came back with massive fire power, and that led to a massacre. According to the U. S., I don't know the actual numbers, but according to U. S. government, about 7 to 10 thousand Somali civilians were killed before this was over. There's a close analysis of all of this by Alex de Waal, who's one of the world's leading specialists on African famine and relief, altogether academic specialist. His estimate is that the number of people saved by the intervention and the number killed by the intervention was approximately in the same ballpark. That's Somalia. That's what's given as a stellar example of the humanitarian intervention.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Responding to the question, "what did the United States have to gain by intervening in Somalia?", regarding Operation Provide Relief/Operation Restore Hope/Battle of Mogadishu.
Quotes 1990s, 1995-1999, Sovereignty and World Order, 1999

People , World , Peace , Food

“Without hesitation, she made a fist and hit herself in the right eye, her knuckles making contact with the top of her cheekbone. And then she poured milk into her coffee.”

Lis Wiehl (1961) American legal scholar

Source: Heart of Ice A Triple Threat Novel with April Henry (Thomas Nelson), p. 201

Coffee

“Not content to have the audience in the palm of his hand; he goes one further and clinches his fist.”

Kenneth Tynan (1927–1980) English theatre critic and writer

On singer Frankie Laine
Curtains (1961)