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Quotes by Canadian Authors
"It's not so much that I got that idea at some point, it came up naturally because of the improvisational nature of the story I was telling."
"I can't look people in the eye and tell them that they're going to die anymore."
"It is a sound principle of finance, and a still sounder principle of government, that those who have the duty of expending the revenue of a country should also be saddled with the responsibility of levying and providing it."
"I was with Ted Turner when he came to see Kofi Annan - the Secretary-General of the UN - to announce his decision to put $1 billion to the service of UN projects and programs."
"The intentions of record companies are not good, from the musician's perspective."
"I have a bad reputation for being temperamental."
"I've made a life and career as a professional musician."
"When you're in the muck you can only see muck. If you somehow manage to float above it, you still see the muck but you see it from a different perspective. And you see other things too. That's the consolation of philosophy."
"Being exposed to theory, stimulated by a basic love of concepts and mathematics, was a marvelous experience."
"Also, when I didn't like something, I could keep my opinion to myself."
"I rise in support of a Canada in which liberties are safeguarded, rights are protected and the people of this land are treated as equals under the law."
"I worked very hard on those movies but there was some creative connection that wasn't being made."
"The name of Jesus, like a secret charm, awakened similar emotions in the hearts of all the converts, and called immediately into action every feeling of moral loveliness, and every desire of dutiful obedience, which constitute Christian purity."
"A sensual life is a ghostly existence where you live on the surface and your soul passes through everything, touching nothing ..."
"He does have surprising, secret purposes. I open a Bible, and His plans, startling, lie there barefaced. It's hard to believe it, when I read it, and I have to come back to it many times, feel long across those words, make sure they are real. His love letter forever silences any doubts: "His secret purpose framed from the very beginning [is] to bring us to our full glory (1 Corinthians 2:7 NEB)."
"The medium is the message. This is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology."
"Well, I think just a desire to come back and be a part of the game again."
"Today it is not the classroom nor the classics which are the repositories of models of eloquence, but the ad agencies."
"Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them."
"Bankers cannot afford to be concerned with only the economic aspects of projects. There may be serious implications on the natural environment, the urban environment, on human culture."
"My own interest in basic aspects of electron transfer between metal complexes became active only after I came to the University of Chicago in 1946."
"I am more convinced than ever that a lively two party system is essential to our democracy."
"You believed you could transcend the body as you aged, she tells herself. You believed you could rise above it, to a serene, nonphysical realm. But it's only through ecstasy you can do that, and ecstasy is achieved through the body itself. Without the bone and sinew of wings, no flight. Without that ecstasy you can only be dragged further down by the body, into its machinery. Its rusting, creaking, vengeful, brute machinery."
"People today think of the world as a uniquely dangerous place. It’s hard to follow the news without feeling a mounting dread of terrorist attacks, a clash of civilizations, and the use of weapons of mass destruction. But we often forget the dangers that filled the news a few decades ago and become blasé about the good fortune that so many of them have fizzled out."
"I became intrigued with colour theory. The absurd pronouncements of the Colour Institute, a group that decides what colours are hot each year or season, amused me."
"Our two major parties are actually called the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party."
"Quebec does not have Opinions, but only sentiments."
"Government is a gun that shoots money at your enemy and blows up in your face."
"Yes, writing is mostly a dream, but angels visit in dreams."
"The whole competition thing disturbs me. Not that I wasn't a part of it when I first started."
"Our monsters walk the dark pathways of secret motives..."
"Religious people today, compartmentalize their attitude to the Bible. They pay it lip service as a symbol of morality while getting their actual morality from more modern principles."
"We'll just sit here," said Barney, "and if we think of anything worth while saying we'll say it. Otherwise, not. Don't imagine you're bound to talk to me.""John Foster says," quoted Valancy, "'If you can sit in silencewith a person for half an hour and yet be entirely comfortable, youand that person can be friends. If you cannot, friends you'llnever be and you need not waste time in trying.'""Evidently John Foster says a sensible thing once in a while,"conceded Barney."
"I'll be honest about it. It is not atheists who get stuck in my craw, but agnostics. Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation."
"A lot of people who read my novel 'Smog City' ask me why I never killed off either of the two main characters. To be honest, it's because I've given them life. Not literally of course, but since I spent so much time developing and creating my characters, they've ended up with complex personalities, in fact they're almost sentient in a way, and to write them off as dead would be like killing a close friend to me."
"Proper process, should not hinder progress. Too much focus on process, has left many blind to measured, tangible progress."
"I love New York. I love the multicultural vibe here. Los Angeles doesn't inspire me in any way. Everyone is in the same industry, yet you feel very isolated."
"Anthology shows as a whole scare people. The networks can't quite get their heads around it."
"The director is planning on titling the film 'Yummy Fur' so we are probably planning on changing the title of the book to 'Yummy Fur' to match the film."
"I think that I was being much more uptight about those things before. I feel like I really don't have to prove anything at this point other than what I'm doing."
"And, of course, the fact that Maurice Strong, a Canadian, was in charge made it important for us to pull up our socks and become leaders in this field. Now, here is a field we should be a leader in!"
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