Mostly for myself.
It is so hard to leave—until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world. John Green (via booksandnerds)

A simple truth. Really must read The Fault in Our Stars soon.

(via farewell-kingdom)

Just pretend you’re in a huge outdoor loony bin. If the inmates get out of control we’ll soak them down with Mace. Hunter S. Thompson, “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved”
theatlantic:

How Cheap Should Books Be?

If the regulators are right, and the big publishing houses really did get together with Apple to plot a price hike, it would seem to be a clear violation of antitrust law — old fashioned price-fixing conspiracies are the sort of corporate skullduggery that can get an executive tossed in jail. Justice’s suit could also mean a return to the wholesale system that gave Amazon its free hand to whittle down prices. 
But one has to wonder if, in this instance, the law is really serving the best interest of the public. Consider this question: are readers really better off in a market dominated by the whims of one large company, even if it means they get to pay a little less for the new Tom Clancy novel?
Read more. [Image: Reuters]

theatlantic:

How Cheap Should Books Be?

If the regulators are right, and the big publishing houses really did get together with Apple to plot a price hike, it would seem to be a clear violation of antitrust law — old fashioned price-fixing conspiracies are the sort of corporate skullduggery that can get an executive tossed in jail. Justice’s suit could also mean a return to the wholesale system that gave Amazon its free hand to whittle down prices. 

But one has to wonder if, in this instance, the law is really serving the best interest of the public. Consider this question: are readers really better off in a market dominated by the whims of one large company, even if it means they get to pay a little less for the new Tom Clancy novel?

Read more. [Image: Reuters]

A wisher, a liar, a magic-bean buyer.

A wisher, a liar, a magic-bean buyer.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And - which is more - you’ll be a Man my son!

Rudyard Kipling
What, indeed, is a New Yorker? Something has been added to him which he had not had before. He is endowed with a briskness and an invention often alien to his blood. He is quicker in his movement, less trammeled in his judgement…The change he undergoes is unmistakable. New York, indeed, resembles a magic cauldron. Those who are cast into it are born again. Charles Whibley, English journalist, “American Sketches,” 1908
The words were on their way, and when they arrived, she would hold them in her hands like the clouds, and she would wring them out like the rain. The Book Thief, Markus Zusak (via fuckyeahliteraryquotes)

Wonderful, wonderful book.

(via tatteredcover)

awesomepeoplehangingouttogether:

Roald Dahl & Ernest Hemingway, London, 1944

awesomepeoplehangingouttogether:

Roald Dahl & Ernest Hemingway, London, 1944