Quotes about sound
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“I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”

Walt Whitman (1819–1892) American poet, essayist and journalist

Song of Myself, 52
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“Was it weird having a witch grandma? Scary? Was she always, like, threatening to cast spells if you were bad?"
"Most of the time she just threatened to send me to my room."
"That doesn't sound so scary to me."
"That's because you haven't met her.”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

Time, Grandma

“You trust me?" Eric sounded surprised.
"Yes."
"That's… crazy, Sookie.”

Charlaine Harris book Living Dead in Dallas

Source: Living Dead in Dallas

“Louisiana in September was like an obscene phone call from nature. The air — moist, sultry, secretive, and far from fresh — felt as if it were being exhaled into one's face. Sometimes it even sounded like heavy breathing.”

Tom Robbins book Jitterbug Perfume

Source: Jitterbug Perfume (1984)

Secret, Nature

“I couldn’t help it,” I said, knowing how lame that sounded. It was as bad as Angeline’s “it’s not my fault” mantra.”

Richelle Mead book The Fiery Heart

Source: The Fiery Heart

Help

“We sat in the car
& the night dropped
down until the
only sounds were
the crickets &
the dance of our voices

& for a moment
the world became
small enough to
roll back & forth
between us.”

Brian Andreas (1956) American artist

Source: Hearing Voices - Volume 5: Collected Stories and Drawings

World, Cars, Dance, Night

“The sound of you, it offends me. Abomination, I command you to be silent.”

Thomas E. Sniegoski (1962) writer

Source: The Fallen and Leviathan

“I'm going to kill the kid. - Barrons says faintly.
Ryodan makes a burbling sound like a bodly laught. -Get in line”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Iced

“Bubba made a sound of disapproval "You're not supposed to be kissing on anybody else, Miss Sookie" he said "Bill said it was okay, but I don't like it.”

Charlaine Harris book Dead to the World

Source: Dead to the World

Kiss

“We do not realize the sound the world makes -- unless, of course, it comes to a stop. Then, when it starts, it sounds like an orchestra.”

Mitch Albom (1958) American author

Source: The Time Keeper

World

“You cannot say 'no' to the people you love, not often. That's the secret. And then when you do, it has to sound like a 'yes'. Or you have to make them say 'no.' You have to take time and trouble.”

Mario Puzo The Godfather

Source: The Godfather

Love, People, Secret, Time

“The voices blend and fuse in clouded silence: silence that is infinite of space: and swiftly, silently the sound is wafted over regions of cycles of cycles of generations that have lived.”

James Joyce Ulysses

Source: Ulysses

Silence

“Everyone thinks I named my cat Mango because of his orange eyes, but that's not the case. I named him Mango because the sounds of his purrs and his wheezes and his meows are all various shades of yellow-orange.”

Wendy Mass (1967) American children's writer

Cats, Thinking

“I am dying: it's a beautiful word. Like the long slow sigh of the cello: dying. But the sound of it is the only beautiful thing about it.”

Sonya Hartnett book Surrender

Source: Surrender

Beauty

“Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows.”

John Betjeman (1906–1984) English poet, writer and broadcaster

Childhood

“As happens sometimes, a moment settled and hovered and remained for much more than a moment. And sound stopped and movement stopped for much, much more than a moment.”

John Steinbeck Of Mice and Men

Source: Of Mice and Men

“I dreamed I was a single moment in a single day.

A note struck and vanished. A sounding. A reckoning. Gone.”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Source: The World and Other Places: Stories

Dreams

“Hey, Hot Stuff, Can’t wait till you get over that guy you were with. He sounds like a real jerk. Hope it’s soon. You’re way too tasty to be alone for too long. Come find me. I’m out here waiting. Your Future”

Greg Behrendt (1963) American comedian

Hope, Jerk, Way, Guy

“Jace Herondale plays the piano very well.”
“And he knows it.”
“That sounds like a Herondale.” Tessa laughed.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Source: City of Heavenly Fire

“Denying the undeniable just makes you sound like a fool as well as a liar.”

Ally Carter book Only the Good Spy Young

Source: Only the Good Spy Young

Fools

“It was the oldest sound there was. Souls flying away.”

Sue Monk Kidd book The Secret Life of Bees

Source: The Secret Life of Bees (2002)

Soul, Flying

“Individual words, sounds, squiggles on paper with no meanings other than those with which our imagination can clothe them.”

Jasper Fforde book The Eyre Affair

Source: The Eyre Affair

Imagination, Clothes

“His own opinion, which he does not air, is that the origin of speech lie in song, and the origins of song in the need to fill out with sound the overlarge and rather empty human soul.”

J.M. Coetzee book Disgrace

Source: Disgrace (1999), p. 3-4
Context: Although he devoted hours of each day to his new discipline, he finds its first premise, as enunciated in the Communications 101 handbook, preposterous: 'Human society has created language in order that we may communicate our thoughts, feelings, and intentions to each other.' His own opinion, which he does not air, is that the origins of speech lie in song, and the origins of song in the need to fill out with sound the overlarge and rather empty human soul.

Lie, Soul

“Which path do you intend to take, Nell?' said the Constable, sounding very interested. 'Conformity or rebellion?'
Neither one. Both ways are simple-minded - they are only for people who cannot cope with contradiction and ambiguity.”

Neal Stephenson (1959) American science fiction writer

Source: The Diamond Age: or, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer

People, Way

“My mother is from Cairo, Georgia. This makes everything she says sound like it went through a curling iron.”

Augusten Burroughs book Running with Scissors

Source: Running with Scissors

“As for hearing, the sloth is not so much deaf as uninterested in sound.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

“For that great Love speaks in the most wretched and dirty hearts; only the tone of its voice depends on the echoes of the place in which it sounds.”

George MacDonald book At the Back of the North Wind

Source: At the Back of the North Wind (1871), Chapter 18

Love, Heart, Dependency

“You love me?"
He just looked at me for a moment. And then he reared back his head and laughed, a rich, mellow sound, unreserved and unashamed. " No, not at all. I regularly battle gods for women I dislike!”

Karen Chance American writer

Source: Hunt the Moon

Love, Women, God

“Wilem snorted."That doesn't sound suspicious at all," he said. "And you wonder why people talk about you."

"I don't wonder why they talk," I said "I wonder what they say.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Wise Man's Fear

Source: The Wise Man's Fear

People

“I'll take the cemetery," Kane said. He didn't sound excited. Rather, he sounded resigned. "The club might collapse if I go.”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

Source: The Darkest Night

“You weren't afraid of me when I was Wolf," he said. "Why are you afraid of Nathan?"
"He's got big feet!"
"What?"
An insulted-sounding arrroooo came from the other side of the door, a reminder that Wolves also had big ears.”

Anne Bishop book Written in Red

Source: Written in Red

Wolf

“I do believe that his given name is something odd. Peregrine, Penrose- Piers, that's it."
"He sounds like a dock." Lord Sundron put in.
"Mrs. Hutchins called me a light frigate this morning," Linnet said "a dock might be just the thing for me.”

Eloisa James (1962) American academic

Source: When Beauty Tamed the Beast

Light

“A couple of times he called the second he'd finished reading a novel and just had to tell me about it, and I know it sounds hokey and librarianish to say so, but I just swooned when he did that.”

Sarah Vowell book Take the Cannoli

Source: Take the Cannoli

Time, Reading

“Hi, Mom…Yes, I know my heart rate’s dangerously elevated. That sound? I’m being shot at, Ma. Gotta go now. Love you much. Hugs and kisses. (Devyn)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Born of Ice

Love, Moms, Kiss, Heart

“I nodded. "Yup. What I did was tantamount to treason in their eyes."
"I don't know what 'tantamount' means, but it sounds pretty serious.”

Richelle Mead Bloodlines

Source: Bloodlines

“Bromidic though it may sound, some questions don't have answers, which is a terribly difficult lesson to learn.”

Katharine Graham (1917–2001) American publisher

Quoted by Jane Howard in The Power That Didn't Corrupt http://books.google.com/books?id=MNSxAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Bromidic+though+it+may+sound+some+questions+don-t+have+answers+which+is+a+terribly+difficult+lesson+to+learn%22, Ms. magazine (October 1974)

Question, Learning