Quotes about pillow (108 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“I put a piece of paper under my pillow, and when I could not sleep I wrote in the dark.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

Sleep

“I buried my head under the darkness of the pillow and pretended it was night. I couldn't see the point of getting up. I had nothing to look forward to.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

Night

“You are still young, free.. Do yourself a favor. Before it's too late, without thinking too much about it first, pack a pillow and a blanket and see as much of the world as you can. You will not regret it. One day it will be too late.”

Jhumpa Lahiri book The Namesake

Source: The Namesake

World , Thinking

“The sick do not ask if the hand that smoothes their pillow is pure, nor the dying care if the lips that touch their brow have known the kiss of sin.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Kiss

“Oh, God, the lovebirds,” Magnus said, pulling the pillow off his face. “I hate happy couples.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Source: City of Heavenly Fire

God , Hate , Happiness

“leave me in peace, let me sleep one night at least without my pillow being wet with tears, my eyes burning and my head throbbing”

Anne Frank (1929–1945) victim of the Holocaust and author of a diary

Source: The Diary of a Young Girl

Peace , Tear , Sleep , Night

“Knowing how they were sleeping on a dirt floor at that very moment, while I had a soft pillow under my head, made me feel incredibly guilty.”

AnnaSophia Robb (1993) American actress, singer, and model

How I Spent My Summer Vacation (2008)

Feeling , Sleep

“"Teddy — I suppose Mummy and Daddy are real, aren't they?"
Teddy said, "You ask such silly questions, David. Nobody knows what 'real' really means. Let's go indoors."
"First I'm going to have another rose!" Plucking a bright pink flower, he carried it with him into the house. It could lie on the pillow as he went to sleep. Its beauty and softness reminded him of Mummy.”

Brian W. Aldiss book Super-Toys Last All Summer Long

Super-Toys Last All Summer Long (1969)

Lie , Beauty , Flowers , Question

“Let either of you breathe a word, or the edge of a word, about the other things, and I will come to you in the black of some terrible night and I will bring a pointy reckoning that will shudder you. And you know I can do it; I saw Indians smash my dear parents' heads on the pillow next to mine, and I have seen some reddish work done at night, and I can make you wish you had never seen the sun go down!”

Arthur Miller The Crucible

Abigail Williams
The Crucible (1953)

Parent , Sun , Night

“The man changed position, turned his back on the wardrobe blocking the door and let his right arm slide down toward the side on which the dog is lying. A minute later, he was awake. He was thirsty. He turned on his bedside light, got up, shuffled his feet into the slippers which were, as always, providing a pillow for the dog's head, and went into the kitchen. Death followed him. The man filled a glass with water and drank it. At this point, the dog appeared, slaked his thirst in the water-dish next to the back door and then looked up at his master. I suppose you want to go out, said the cellist. He opened the door and waited until the animal came back. A little water remained in his glass. Death looked at it and made an effort to imagine what it must be like to feel thirsty, but failed. She would have been equally incapable of imagining it when she'd had to make people die of thirst in the desert, but at the time she hadn't even tried. The dog returned, wagging his tail. Let's go back to sleep, said the man. They went into the bedroom again, the dog turned around twice, then curled up into a ball. The man drew the sheet up to his neck, coughed twice and soon afterward was asleep again. Sitting in her corner, death was watching. Much later, the dog got up from the carpet and jumped onto the sofa. For the first time in her life, death knew what it felt like to have a dog on her lap.”

José Saramago book Death with Interruptions

Source: Death with Interruptions (2005), p. 172

Life , Death , People , Dogs

“His thoughts, delivered to me
From the white coverlet and pillow,
I see now, were inheritances—
Delicate riders of the storm.”

Hart Crane (1899–1932) American writer

Praise for an Urn (l. 5-8). In The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, by Richard Ellmann and Robert O'Clair (1988)

“It's not about having things figured out, or about communicating with other people, trying to make them understand what you understand. It's about a chicken dinner at a drive-in. A soft pillow. Things that don't need explaining.”

Ann Beattie (1947) Short story writer, novelist, professor

Source: Walks with Men

People , Communication , Understanding

“I put my head under my pillow and let the quiet put things where they are supposed to be.”

Stephen Chbosky book The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Variant: Put my head under my pillow, and let the quiet put things where they are supposed to be.
Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

“But the face on the pillow, rosy in the firelight, is certainly that of Clarice Starling, and she sleeps deeply, sweetly, in the silence of the lambs.”

Thomas Harris The Silence of the Lambs

Source: The Silence of the Lambs

Sleep , Silence

“The desire to never leave your side, the desire to never see you again. The desire to see your face asleep on the pillow beside my face and to see your eyes open in the morning when I lie next to you—just watching you, waiting for you to wake up.”

John Irving book Until I Find You

Source: Until I Find You

Lie , Waiting

“I seriously needed an extra-strength magic pillow, because my ba refused to stay put. [And no, Sadie, I don't think wrapping my head in duct tape would've worked either. ]”

Rick Riordan book The Red Pyramid

Source: The Red Pyramid

Thinking

“He also didn't mind Piper's using him for a pillow. She had a cute way of breathing when she slept - inhaling through the nose, exhaling with a little puff through the mouth. He was also disappointed when she woke up.”

Rick Riordan book The Lost Hero

Source: The Lost Hero

Disappointment , Way

“Then I went to bed and cried into my pillow. I wasn't sad, not at all. It was just so beautiful to have an intense feeling and the right words at the same time.

What are we but our stories?”

James Patterson book Sam's Letters to Jennifer

Source: Sam's Letters to Jennifer

Sadness , Beauty , Feeling , Time

“The book she had been reading was under her pillow, pressing its cover against her ear as if to lure her back into its printed pages.”

Cornelia Funke Inkheart trilogy

Source: Inkheart

Books , Reading

“Built like an oak tree, against which I could pitch my pillow and read; mornings, I could curl into the crook of your branches.”

Lionel Shriver book We Need to Talk About Kevin

Source: We Need to Talk About Kevin

Tree , Reading

“I got ready for bed and crawled in. The covers were comfortable and warm, but the pillow was just too weird. It gave me neck cramps, so I put it on the floor and went to sleep without it.
My first big mistake.”

Rick Riordan book The Red Pyramid

Source: The Red Pyramid

Sleep

“Pack a pillow and blanket and see as much of the world as you can. You will not regret it.”

Jhumpa Lahiri book The Namesake

Source: The Namesake

World

“Before leaving my room
i turn, and (stooping
through the morning) kiss
this pillow, dear
where our heads lived and were.”

E.E. Cummings (1894–1962) American poet

Kiss

“When I wake up, my pillow’s cold and damp with tears. But tears for what? I have no idea.”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore

Idea , Tear

“The pillow smells like the sunlight, a precious smell.”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore

“And when thou art weary I'll find thee a bed,
Of mosses and flowers to pillow thy head.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Source: The Complete Poems

Art , Flowers

“I stood there watching Phoebe arrange the pillows and the sheets. She isn't thinking that I… I mean, she doesn't think that she and I would… WHAT?”

James Patterson book The Dangerous Days of Daniel X

Source: The Dangerous Days of Daniel X

Thinking

“Well I am still not drunk" I straightened up against the pillows as best I could. "You told me once that if you could still stand up, you weren't drunk."
You aren't standing up." he point out.
You are.”

Diana Gabaldon book Voyager

Source: Voyager

“Then, I turned around and walked to my room and closed my door and put my head under my pillow and let the quiet put things where they are supposed to be.”

Stephen Chbosky (1970) American writer

“Remember when i slept with my head
in a puddle at your feet?
It was humility, or atonement.
later your ankle was a pillow and
finally you pulled me up and in my sleep i
placed your hand above my heart,
like i forgot i didn't live there
anymore”

Michelle Tea (1971) American writer

Sleep , Heart

“No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.”

Lin Yutang (1895–1976) Chinese writer

"A Trip to Anhwei", in With Love And Irony (1940), p. 145

Beauty , Travel , Home

“I knew I would be in the story somewhere," Eugenides interjected.
"Oh no," said Phresine, "This was a humble servant."
"Ouch."
"Though very courageous."
"Not me," whispered Eugenides to his pillow.”

Megan Whalen Turner The King of Attolia

Source: The King of Attolia

Courage

“When I lay my head on the pillow at night I can say I was a decent person today. That's when I feel beautiful.”

Drew Barrymore (1975) American actress, director and producer

Beauty , Feeling , Personality , Night

“Tessa was laying on her side, her brown hair spread over the pillow, watching Will, whose face was bent over the pages, with a look of tenderness in her eyes, a tenderness mirrored in the softness of Will's voice as he read.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Princess

Source: Clockwork Princess

Reading

“When tough times come, it is particularly important to offset them with much gentle softness. Be a pillow.”

Vera Nazarian (1966) American writer

Source: The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

Time

“Homework is not an option. My bed is sending out serious nap rays. I can't help myself. The fluffy pillows and warm comforter are more powerful than I am. I have no choice but to snuggle under the covers.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Speak

Source: Speak

Help

“Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer. And let faith be the bridge you build to overcome evil and welcome good.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Source: Celebrations: Rituals of Peace and Prayer

Birthday , Faith , Evil , Gratitude

“Defeat I can endure with cheerfulness, my lady. But betrayal is like taking the wind from my sails, or the earth from beneath my feet. It chills my spirits like a rainy day, and all I can do is draw the curtains and cry into my pillow.”

Margaret George (1943) American writer

Source: Mary Queen of Scotland and The Isles

Betrayal , Drawing , Cry

“Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head”

Michel De Montaigne (1533–1592) (1533-1592) French-Occitan author, humanistic philosopher, statesman

“it was the period I think of as the age of the pillow... What I wanted to bring out - is that which cannot be measured - I wanted to bring out the tired movement in the eyelids - the lips must look as though they are whispering - she must look as though she is breathing - I want life - what is alive.”

Edvard Munch (1863–1944) Norwegian painter and printmaker

on his painting 'The sick Child'
As quoted in 'From my rotting body, flowers shall grow, and I am in them, and that is eternity', Potter P. Emerg Infect Dis, 2011
after 1930

Life , Age , Thinking , Painting

“When I woke up, I found
by my pillow a teddy bear
instead of you.”

Ayumi Hamasaki (1978) Japanese recording artist, lyricist, model, and actress

Teddy Bear
Lyrics, Duty

“And then I awoke and yet continued to dream… painting constantly appeared to me as the one and only possible achievement. I thought of my grand old friend Henri Rousseau [French Primitive painter, died in 1910] that Homer in the porter's lodge whose prehistoric dreams have sometimes brought me near the gods. I saluted him in my dream. Near him I saw William Blake, noble emanation of English genius...'Have confidence in your objects,' he said, 'do not let yourself be intimidated by the horror of the world. Everything is ordered and correct and must fulfill its destiny in order to attain perfection. Seek this path'... I awoke and found myself in Holland in the midst of boundless world turmoil. But my belief in the final release and absolution of all things, whether they please or torment, was newly strengthened. Peacefully I laid my head among the pillows… to sleep, and dream, again.”

Max Beckmann (1884–1950) German painter, draftsman, printmaker, sculptor and writer

1930s, On my Painting (1938)

God , World , Dreams , Confidence

“It was the waste of a trip. She's not here," I tell him. Buttercup hisses again. "She's not here. You can hiss all you like. You won't find Prim." At her name, he perks up. Raises his flattened ears. Begins to meow hopefully. "Get out!" He dodges the pillow I throw at him. "Go away! There's nothing left for you here!" I start to shake, furious with him. "She's not coming back! She's never ever coming back here again!" I grab another pillow and get to my feet to improve my aim. Out of nowhere, the tears begin to pour down my cheeks. "She's dead." I clutch my middle to dull the pain. Sink down on my heels, rocking the pillow, crying. "She's dead, you stupid cat. She's dead.”

Suzanne Collins (1962) American television writer and novelist

Katniss and Buttercup (p. 386)
The Hunger Games trilogy, Mockingjay (2010)

Pain , Stupidity , Cats , Tear

“This morning I will not
Comb my hair.
It has lain
Pillowed on the hand of my lover.”

Kakinomoto no Hitomaro (662–710) Japanese poet

XX, p. 22
Kenneth Rexroth's translations, One Hundred Poems from the Japanese (1955)

Lovers

“Thud. My eyes are open. It is four-thirty in the morning, one morning, and my dry eyes click in their sockets, awake before the birds. There is no light. The eye strains for logic, some play of form. I have been dreaming of wind. The tree outside my window stands silent. I listen to the breathing of the man lying beside me. I know where I am. I am awake. I am alive. Am I tethered to earth only by this fragile breath? A strawful of breath at best. Yet this is the breath that patients beg, their hands gripping the edges of mattresses; this is the breath that wrestles trees, that brings down all the leaves in the Third Act. We know where the car is parked. We know, word-for-word, the texts of plays. We have spoken, in proximity to one another, over years, sentences, hundreds of thousands of sentences—bright, grave, fallible, comic, perishable—perhaps eternal? I don’t know. Where does the wind go? When will the light come? We will have hotcakes for breakfast. How can I protect this...? My church teaches me I cannot. And I believe it. I turn the pillow to its cool side. Then rage fills me, against the cubist necessity of having to arrange myself comically against orthodoxy, against having to wonder if I will offend, against theology that devises that my feeling for him, more than for myself, is a vanity. My brown paradox: The church that taught me to understand love, the church that taught me well to believe love breathes—also tells me it is not love I feel, at four in the morning, in the dark, even before the birds cry. Of every hue and caste am I.”

Richard Rodríguez (1944) American journalist and essayist

Brown : The Last Discovery of America (2003)

Love , Dreams , Cars , Feeling

“I could stuff a pillow with the amount of confetti I have had thrown at me. And could I sleep easily on that? No.”

Jeffrey Bernard (1932–1997) British journalist

Ibid. (03.01.87)

Sleep

“The Welsh boy has it by his bed,
(He's lame - one leg blown away -
He'll lie propped up with pillows there,
And wind the handle half the day.
His neighbour, with the shattered arm,
Picks out the records he must play.”

Eva Dobell (1876–1963) British poet

Unsourced, In A Soldiers' Hospital II: Gramophone Tunes

Lie , Boy

“I sit at home
In our room
By our bed
Gazing at your pillow.”

Kakinomoto no Hitomaro (662–710) Japanese poet

XXV, p. 27
Kenneth Rexroth's translations, One Hundred Poems from the Japanese (1955)

Home

“When one exchanged the rowing-seat for a place in the bottom of the boat, he suffered a bodily depression that caused him to be careless of everything save an obligation to wiggle one finger. There was cold sea-water swashing to and fro in the boat, and he lay in it. His head, pillowed on a thwart, was within an inch of the swirl of a wave crest, and sometimes a particularly obstreperous sea came in-board and drenched him once more. But these matters did not annoy him. It is almost certain that if the boat had capsized he would have tumbled comfortably out upon the ocean as if he felt sure it was a great soft mattress.”

Stephen Crane book The Open Boat

Pt. IV
The Open Boat (1894)

Suffering , Water , Sea

“You have 2,000 girls who are killed in the womb every day. Some are born and have pillows on their faces choking them.”

Maneka Gandhi (1956) Indian politician and activist

On female foeticide and female infanticide, as quoted in "Indian minister says 2,000 girls 'killed' every day" http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/21/us-india-girls-abortions-idUSKBN0NC12320150421, Reuters (21 April 2015)
2011-present

Girl

“He wanted a home desperately. He was close to the point where he would take a mattress in Hell if the Devil would lend him a pillow.”

Tad Williams (1957) novelist

Source: Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, Stone of Farewell (1990), Chapter 14, “A Crown of Fire” (p. 342).

Home , Hell

“You once said long ago
while stroking my hair,
"When you wake up, there'll be
a nice present
by your pillow."”

Ayumi Hamasaki (1978) Japanese recording artist, lyricist, model, and actress

Teddy Bear
Lyrics, Duty

“Maybe you've put your faith in spiritual claptrap because our random, narrative-free universe terrifies you. But that's no solution. If you want comforting, suck your thumb. Buy a pillow. Don't make up a load of floaty blah about energy or destiny. This is the real world, stupid. We should be solving problems, not sticking our fingers in our ears and singing about fairies.”

Charlie Brooker (1971) journalist, broadcaster and writer from England

[Screen Burn, http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguide/columnists/story/0,,2145124,00.html, The Guardian, 11 August 2007, 2007-08-19]
Guardian columns, Screen Burn

Stupidity , World , Faith , Problem

“The dream on the pillow,
That flits with the day,
The leaf of the willow
A breath wears away;
The dust on the blossom,
The spray on the sea;
Ay,—ask thine own bosom—
Are emblems of thee.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

(29th March 1823) Song - The dream on the pillow.
The London Literary Gazette, 1823

Dreams , Sea

“I settled at Cold Mountain long ago
Already it seems like ages
Wandering free I roam the woods and streams
Lingering to watch things be themselves
Men don't come this far into the mountains
Where white clouds gather and billow
Dry grass makes a comfortable mattress
The blue sky is a fine quilt
Happy to pillow my head on the rock
I leave heaven and earth to endless change”

Han-shan Chinese monk and poet

Cold Mountain Transcendental Poetry

Men , Age , Mountain , Grass

“In New Mexico he always awoke a young man…Beautiful surroundings, the society of learned men, the charm of noble women, the graces of art, could not make up to him for the loss of those light-hearted mornings of the desert, for that wind that made one a boy again. He had noticed that this peculiar quality in the air of new countries vanished after they were tamed by man and made to bear harvests… That air would disappear from the whole earth in time, perhaps; but long after his day. He did not know just when it had become so necessary to him, but he had come back to die in exile for the sake of it. Something soft and wild and free, something that whispered to the ear on the pillow, lightened the heart, softly, softly picked the lock, slid the bolts, and released the prisoned spirit of man into the wind, into the blue and gold, into the morning, into the morning!”

Willa Cather book Death Comes for the Archbishop

Book IX, Ch. 3
Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927)

Women , Men , Beauty , Art

“Mariam is never very far, she is here, in these walls they've repainted, in the trees they've planted, in the blankets that keep the children warm, in these pillows and books and pencils. She is in the children's laughter. She is in the verses Aziza recites and in the prayers she mutters when she bows westward. But, mostly, Miriam is in Laila's own heart, where she shines with the bursting radiance of a thousand suns.”

Khaled Hosseini book A Thousand Splendid Suns

Source: A Thousand Splendid Suns (2007), Chapter, 51.

Children , Books , Laughter , Tree

“The innocent seldom find an uncomfortable pillow.”

William Cowper (1731–1800) (1731–1800) English poet and hymnodist

A misquotation of "The innocent seldom find an uneasy pillow", from James Fenimore Cooper's The Red Rover (1827), ch. 23.
Misattributed

“I very much enjoyed working on the drawing, so much so that I made a whole series of small watercolors that I can use at any time for application on embroidered purses, pillows, rugs and wall hangings.”

Sophie Taeuber-Arp (1889–1943) Swiss artist

Quote in a letter to her sister Erika Schlegel, 22 February, 1922; from: Today is Tomorrow, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, ed. Thomas Schmutz; Aargauer Kunsthaus, and Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess, 2014, p. 221
Taeuber describes creating a series of watercolors that she intends to rework across carpets, bags, pillows, and wall covers

Time , Drawing

“Afterward Larry felt as if he had been through a long pillow-fight in which all the pillows had been treated with a low-grade poison gas.”

Stephen King book The Stand

The Stand (1978)

Fight

“I want morning-after pills more than over the counter; I want morning-after pills with my check at dinner. I want morning-after pills on my hotel pillow when I go to bed at night.”

Margaret Cho (1968) American stand-up comedian

From Her Tours and CDs, Assassin CD

Night

“In the morning theres a buzz of flies
Between the pillows and the skies that beg into your eyes
Through the looking glass in between your thighs
It's really no small surprise
How it goes straight down the rabbit hole
There it goes”

Pete Doherty (1979) English musician, writer, actor, poet and artist

"Through the Looking Glass"
Lyrics and poetry

“There's rain on my window
But I'm thinking of you
Tears on my pillow
But I will come through
Josephine
I'll send you all my love
And every single step, I'll take
I'll take for you”

Chris Rea (1951) English singer-songwriter

"Josephine"
Song lyrics, Shamrock Diaries (1985)

Love , Thinking , Tear

“All the sciences in the world never smoothed down a dying pillow. No earthly philosophy ever supplied hope in death.”

J.C. Ryle (1816–1900) Anglican bishop

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 530.

Death , World , Hope , Science

“To-night she will spread her brown hair on his pillow,
But I shall be hearing the harsh cries of wild fowl.”

Patrick MacDonogh (1902–1961) Irish poet

She Walked Unaware (1975)

Night

“If the mattress stains were anything to go by, a previous user had not so much suffered from incontinence as rejoiced in it. He had evidently included the pillow in his celebrations.”

Bill Bryson A Walk in the Woods

Source: A Walk in the Woods (1997), Chapter 6 (p. 81)

Suffering

“Rocking on a lazy billow
With roaming eyes,
Cushioned on a dreamy pillow,
Thou art now wise.
Wake the power within thee slumbering,
Trim the plot that's in thy keeping,
Thou wilt bless the task when reaping
Sweet labour's prize.”

John Stuart Blackie (1809–1895) Scottish scholar and man of letters

Address to the Edinburgh Students. Quoted by Lord Iddlesleigh, Desultory Reading; reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 756.

Art

“Those no-sooner-have-I-touched-the-pillow people are past my comprehension. There is something suspiciously bovine about them.”

J.B. Priestley (1894–1984) English writer

"The Dark Hours", in Too Many People, and Other Reflections http://books.google.com/books?id=WXRMy9eD_GkC&q="Those+no+sooner+have+I+touched+the+pillow+people+are+past+my+comprehension+There+is+something+suspiciously+bovine+about+them"&pg=PA80#v=onepage (1928).

People , Past

“On the same day as I started to keep my own pillow-book -- I met my future husband for the first time. I was six, he was ten. We did not exchange a word. He had been hand-picked by my father's publisher.”

Peter Greenaway (1942) British film director

Nagiko's journal for Sep 16 1993
The Pillow Book

Books , Time , Future

“A rich man’s body is like a premium cotton pillow, white and soft and blank. ‘’Ours’’ is different. My father’s spine was a knotted rope, the kind that women use in villages to pull water from wells; the clavicle curved around his neck in high relief, like a dog’s collar; cuts and nicks and scars, like little whip marks in his flesh, ran down his chest and waist, reaching down below his hip bones into his buttocks. The story of a poor man’s life is written on his body, in a sharp pen.”

Aravind Adiga book The White Tiger

The First Night.
The White Tiger (2008)

Life , Women , Dogs , Water

“But he had turned, little by little, a disturbance into words, he had made a pillow of old words, for his head.”

Samuel Beckett book Watt

Part II, p. 117
Watt (1943)

“I told him to smother Linda with a pillow while she was sleeping. All he said was “Can’t live with ’em, can’t smother ’em with a pillow."”

Matthew Good (1971) Canadian singer-songwriter

I disagreed.
At Last There is Nothing Left to Say

Sleep

“I sat before my typewriter and the great awful void descended, and I beat my head with my fists, put a pillow under my aching buttocks and made little noises of agony.”

John Fante book Ask the Dust

Ask the Dust (1939)

“the color of the sky as far as I can see is coal gray
lift my head from the pillow and then fall again
with a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather
a quiver in my lips as if I might cry”

Natalie Merchant (1963) American singer-songwriter

Song lyrics, In My Tribe (1987), Like The Weather

Color , Thinking , Cry , Weather

“What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.”

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797–1851) English novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer

Introduction http://www.rc.umd.edu/editions/frankenstein/1831v1/intro.html to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein

“I brewed potions in a vain search for life everlasting,
I read books, I sang songs of history,
And today I've come home to Cold Mountain
To pillow my head on the stream and wash my ears.”

Han-shan Chinese monk and poet

Cold Mountain: 100 Poems by the T'ang Poet Han-shan

Life , Books , Home , History

“Take patience as your pillow, hug poverty, discard lusts, oppose your desires and know that you are seen by God, so look at how you are.”

Muhammad al-Taqi (811–835) ninth of the Twelve Imams of Twelver Shi'ism

Ibn Shu’ba al-Harrani, Tuhaf al-'Uqul, p. 479
Religious Wisdom

God , Patience

“Men are like pillow-cases. The colour of one may be red, that of another blue, and that of the third black; but all contain the same cotton within. So it is with man; one is beautiful, another is ugly, a third holy, and a fourth wicked; but the Divine Being dwells in them all”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

Source: Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (1960), p. 37

Men , Beauty

“Yamanaka: "The first thing I want you to know is about dodo's. 'Dodo' is the name of an extinct bird which is big but cannot fly. I made the song likening the 'bird' to bands I like, such as 'a great musician who passed away' or 'the split-up band'. Life is mortal, all things die. The last day will psychically also come to a band. However, I sing this song lightly to oppose these themes, something like "even if I die, I'll be back!" or "Only the pillows won't break up, right!?" It's not a very serious song, more a positive one. This song has an alternative sound, which I really like lately."”

Sawao Yamanaka (1968) Japanese singer-songwriter

Source: http://www.jame-world.com/us/articles-2700-wake-up-the-pillows-interview.html

Life , Bird , Singing , Flying

“While we are laid on the battle plain,
Drenched to the skin by the midnight rain,
Pleasant dreams may thy slumber crown,
As thou sinkest to rest amid silk and down :
But shame beside thy pillow stand!
A German maid shall kiss thee not,
A German song rejoice thee not,
And German wine shall warm thee not!
He who has strength to wield a brand,
Let him draw it now for his father-land!”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

The London Literary Gazette (3rd January 1835) Versions from the German (First Series.) - 'The Gathering' — Koerner.
Translations, From the German

Dreams , Kiss , Wine , Drawing

“Faith is the backbone of the social and the foundation of the commercial fabric; remove faith between man and man, and society and commerce fall to pieces. There is not a happy home on earth but stands on faith; our heads are pillowed on it, we sleep at night in its arms with greater security for the safety of our lives, peace, and prosperity than bolts and bars can give.”

Thomas Guthrie (1803–1873) British divine

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 218.

Peace , Faith , Home , Sleep

“Lay your head upon my pillow
Hold your warm and tender body
Close to mine
Hear the whisper of the raindrops
Blow softly against my window
Make believe you love me
One more time
For the good times
For the good times..”

Kris Kristofferson (1936) American country music singer, songwriter, musician, and film actor

For the Good Times
Song lyrics, Kristofferson (1970)

Love , Time

“They're always telling me I'm too angry
Especially when I mention land theft or rape or genocide
They go to therapy to understand themselves
pound anonymous pillows safely with a stranger
in the closed room of improper behavior
There is
no pillow I’m angry with.”

Chrystos (1946) American writer, activist

"They're always telling me I'm too angry" (1995)

Behavior , Understanding

“It is the hour when the swarm of malevolent dreams
Makes sun-browned adolescents writhe upon their pillows.”

Charles Baudelaire book Les Fleurs du mal

C'était l'heure où l'essaim des rêves malfaisants
Tord sur leurs oreillers les bruns adolescents.
"Le Crépuscule du Matin" [Morning Twilight] http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_cr%C3%A9puscule_du_matin
Les fleurs du mal (Flowers of Evil) (1857)

Dreams , Sun