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The sky at the top of the gray ocean has become much lighter now. The sun is about to rise. I will end this recording for now and stop the bus and walk outside and watch the sun rise over the ocean.
My God, the world can be beautiful.

— Walter Tevis Mockingbird (1980)

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Beauty

More quotes by Walter Tevis

Only the mockingbird sings at the edge of the woods.

Mockingbird (1980)

He thought, looking at the cat, if only you were the intelligent species on this world. And then, smiling wryly, maybe you are.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)

The woman beside me hesitated a moment, and then said softly, “This man is different, Mary. He’s a Reader.”

Mockingbird (1980)

“But, damn it, you’re not gods.”
“No, but have your gods ever saved you before?”
“I don’t know. No, of course not.”

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)

It always horrified Bryce to see professors fawn on businessmen—the very men they ridiculed in their private conversations—whenever a research contract might be in the offing.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (1963)

All Walter Tevis quotes →

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Beautiful objects are wrought by study through effort, but ugly things are reaped automatically without toil.

Democritus Freeman (1948)

True beauty dwells in deep retreats,
Whose veil is unremoved
Till heart with heart in concord beats,
And the lover is beloved.

William Wordsworth

The great artists are the ones who dare to entitle to beauty things so natural that when they're seen afterward, people say: Why did I never realize before that this too was beautiful?

André Gide The Immoralist (1902)

Beauty itself doth of itself persuade
The eyes of men without an orator.

William Shakespeare The Rape of Lucrece (1594)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Walter Tevis (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.