What is the greatest line in modern fiction?

[XemaSab]

:shrug:

[Aristus]

1. "It was a cold day in April, and the clocks were just striking thirteen."

The first line of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.

[flvegan]

2. Leave the gun, take the canolli.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

3. so long and t hanks for all the fish.

:shrug:

[EFerrari]

40. "And nothing continued to happen."

I think that's from Dirk Gently's. :)

[Tuesday Afternoon]

4. Last night I dreamed of Manderlay.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

5. Frankly, Scarlett. I don't give a damn.

[EastTennesseeDem]

6. "NOT MY DAUGHTER YOU BITCH!"

Same book incidentally.

[XemaSab]

10. +1

:D

[Amerigo Vespucci]

7. "The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk...

...mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!"

[begin_within]

12. I was going to post this one:

"And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy I had always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiances shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven."

or,

"I was so high I had to lean my head back on the seat, the bouncing of the car sent shivers of ecstasy through me."

[Jamastiene]

8. "When I stepped out into the bright sunlight..."

That part of the sentence has always really stuck with me for some reason. It's my personal favorite.

[LearnedHand]

9. "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

Anna Karenina

[barb162]

36. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

[bridgit]

11. Well, I mean there so many but here's one: Marv...

"I love hitmen. No matter what you do to them, you don't feel bad."

edit fer pic

dammit edit fer that stank ass pic too and these are cool pic shit bitches :rant:

[Odin2005]

13. Stand up kid, your father's passin'. (To Kill a Mockingbird)

[MissMillie]

18. that would be

"Miss Jean Louise, stand up. You're father's passing"

But yeah, that ranks right up there.

[Odin2005]

21. ACK, it''s been a while since I've read it, my bad!

[rug]

14. Call me fishmeal.

[nuxvomica]

15. "Death destroys a man: the idea of death saves him"

E.M. Forster, Howard's End

I think that says it all. In mathematical terms, it's represented by the number 42. ;-)

[sarge43]

16. It was a dark and stormy night .... n/t

[KamaAina]

17. "We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold."

At least I hope Fear and Loathing is fiction... :scared:

edit: header

[nomorenomore08]

20. +1

And for the record, I think it's *close enough* to fiction, but who really knows? :shrug:

[qnr]

19. "The End"

Well, a heck of a lot of authors seem to like it, at least....

[AlienGirl]

22. "Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt."

[Orrex]

30. So it goes.

[pitohui]

23. "in five years the penis will be obsolete, said the salesman"

what can i say, i'm a sucker for the classics

[undeterred]

24. So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.

[Xithras]

25. +1

[appamado amata padam]

26. ' "Nice tame animals anyhow,"

the Controller murmured parenthetically. '

Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

[LeftyMom]

27. "Lord Tywin Lannister did not, in the end, shit gold."

[XemaSab]

33. JK could beat the shit out of RR with her hands tied behind her back

:o

[Sgent]

28. "People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything."

"People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People’s heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool."

Wizard's First Rule (from the book of the same name by Terry Goodkind).

[Moondog]

29. "But the old man always thought of her as feminine

and as something that gave or withheld great favors, and if she did wild or wicked things it was because she could not help them. The moon affects her as it does a woman, he thought."

The Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway

[frogmarch]

31. "It is in the nature of things

that those who save the world from certain destruction often don't get hugely rewarded because, since the certain destruction does not take place, people are uncertain how certain it may have been and are, therefore, somewhat tight when it comes to handing out anything more substantial than praise." Terry Pratchett The Last Hero

[Beer on a stick]

32. Well, he see this one particularly hot chick and not does she bag he slackjawed....

but he lets a "Whoa" slip out.

[Deja Q]

34. "There is an old Vulcan proverb: Only Nixon could go to China." - Mr. Spock

"No peace in our time." - General Chang, Star Trek VI
"Once more onto the breach, dear friends" - General Chang, Star Trek VI

Heck, that movie was made FOR General Chang... :D


:D

[underpants]

35. I don't read fiction- reality is strange enough

[Danger Mouse]

37. Don't listen to the haters.

We know what's good.
Dinner, Nagini FTW.

[Ten Bears]

38. "Old-timers, maybe," snapped the captain.

"But since their day a new decree has been passed, and now the sun stands highest at one."

[Robeson]

39. Impossible to say.

[mikeSchmuckabee]

41. It was love at first sight.

The first time Yossarian saw the chaplain he fell madly in love with him.

OR

Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead...

[VOX]

42. "They threw me off the hay truck around noon."

First line from James M. Cain's "The Postman Always Rings Twice."

One of the best openers in literature -- so much is established in just nine words.

[RFKHumphreyObama]

43. "Jean Louise. Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passing ...

[HamdenRice]

44. "snow was general all over Ireland"

"A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had
begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark,
falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to
set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow
was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark
central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of
Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous
Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely
churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly
drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the
little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard
the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like
the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead."

--James Joyce, "The Dead"