Precious Gift

But you must also know this, Thoma, you must accept the inescapable truth. Even an alcoholic gives his son a gift. A precious gift, in fact. You will never ever be a drunkard. That is how it is, that is how it goes.

The happiest man in the world are the men who swore that they would never become their fathers. That is how the alpha males became endangered. Their sons decided that they would not become their fathers, they would be decent men, they would not sleep with strangers through the night, they would buy curtains, they would transfer food from large bowls into smaller bowls and put them in the fridge, they would not be their fathers. In a world full of new men who did not want to be their fathers, what chance did the alpha males have?
- The Illicit Happiness of Other People, Manu Joseph 

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The major problem, one of the major problems, for there are several, with governing people is that of who you get to do it. Or, rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. To summarize: it is a well known and much lamented fact that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made president should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem.

- Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

I finally finished reading the five novel compilation of 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' yesterday. To write such a book one has to be a genius and a champion of wit mixed with a general sciency mish mash. Apart from his regular gymnast with the space-time-probability axis, Mr. Douglas Adams' knack of inventing character names is highly commendable. It's like he just noticed an object, played around with it's spelling and then named it a small little planet at the center of the third probability axis of infinite improbable drive. Apart from his usual excellence in making up things, he quite enjoyed taking a dig at other irritating aspects of being an earthling, say religion, McDonalds, credit cards, telephones, astrology etc. And one of the great things about the book is how quotable it is. Flip open any page and you will have something clever written down. You can literally calendar your social network feeds with these quotes. Here's one more - 

Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws. 

Maurice Sendak

I did some very good books, which mostly is an isolationist form of life – doing books, doing pictures. And it’s the only true happiness I’ve ever, ever enjoyed in my life. It’s sublime to just go into another room and make pictures. It’s magic time where all your weaknesses of character, and all blemishes of personality, and whatever else torments you fades away, just doesn’t matter.
 
You’re doing the one thing you want to do and you do it well, and you know you do it well, and you’re happy. The whole promise is to do the work, sitting down at a drawing table, turning on the radio. And I think, “what a transcendent life this is that I’m doing everything I want to do.”
 
At that moment I feel like I’m a lucky man. I’m trying very hard to concentrate on what is here, what I can see, what I can smell, what I can feel – making that the important business of life. Just looking out the window at the colours that I see, reading Charles Dickens at night for an hour, little rituals I have of listening to Mozart. I’m learning how not to take myself so seriously, that what I’m working on, what I’d like to work on, it’s not earthshakingly important anymore. I am not earthshakingly important.

So what am I saying? I’m just clearing the decks for a simple death. You’re done with your work, you’re done with your life. And your life was your work.
 
I think what I’ve offered was different. But not because I drew better than anybody, or wrote better than anybody, but because I was more honest than anybody. And in the discussion of children, and the lives of children, and the fantasies of children, and the language of children, I said anything I wanted, because I don’t believe in children. I don’t believe in childhood. I don’t believe there’s a demarcation of “you mustn’t tell them this, you mustn’t tell them that.” You tell them anything you want. Just tell them if it’s true. If it’s true, you tell them.
 
I have adult thoughts in my head, experiences, but I’m never going to talk about them. I’m never going to write about that. Why is my needle stuck in childhood? I don’t know. I don’t know. I guess that’s where my heart is.

Taken from - Drawn blog post.
- Maurice Sendak. Writer and illustrator of children's literature. One of his most notable work is 'Where the Wild Things Are'.

At times you hear the words that speak so true to your thoughts that you wish they were your own. Thank You Maurice Sendak.

Cakes and Ale

The first book I read of W. Somerset Maugham was 'The Razor's edge'. I read 'Theatre' afterwards and after a good two years, I picked another of his book 'Cakes and Ale'. I noticed how Maugham has thrown a punch on the pretentious glass walls throughout in his writing. His writing style eases down beautifully in the reader's eye and his analogies fit the situations like a soft wooden door. Today morning, I was reading a few pages from 'Cakes and Ale' and on page number 157, a line struck me with its simple truth. This book deals with the diplomatic nuisance coming in play when draping an author's life with ornaments that he never aspired for. It has been a good read so far.

Reality of my desires.

"I take my desires for reality because I believe in the

reality of my desires."
Anonymous graffiti, Paris 1968, Adbusters Magazine.