By Aiyana Edmund | On September 20, 2018 | Updated April 30, 2022 | Comments (0)
Emma by Jane Austen (1775 – 1817) was first published in December, 1815. Before she began the novel, Austen wrote, “I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like.”
In the first sentence she introduces the main character as “Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich.” Emma is privileged and headstrong, greatly overestimating her matchmaking abilities, her imagination often leading her astray.
Emma was the last novel to be completed and published during Jane Austen’s life, as Persuasion, the last novel Austen wrote, was published posthumously. Emma has been adapted for several films, many television series, multiple stage plays, and has been the inspiration for several novels. Following are a collection of quotes from Emma, a novel that has been said to have “changed the face of fiction”: Read More→
By Taylor Jasmine | On August 28, 2018 | Updated June 29, 2023 | Comments (2)
Vita Sackville-West (1892 – 1962), the British author known for All Passion Spent and The Edwardians (as well as for her great friendship with Virginia Woolf) was nearly equally known for her passion for gardening and garden design. Enjoy the selection of quotes by Vita Sackville-West on gardens and gardening in this post — they’re wonderful metaphors for life itself!
The gardens at Sissinghurst, the home she shared with Harold Nicolson, are masterful. Though she considered herself an amateur, she remains a respected name in garden design.
Vita had a voice that was at once authoritative yet never bossy, often acknowledging that the garden can become the master of its caretaker, rather than the other way around. Something that always comes through is her passion for gardens, gardening, and beauty in bloom. According to The Telegraph in a recent appraisal of Vita’s gardening legacy:
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By Aiyana Edmund | On August 23, 2018 | Updated April 6, 2023 | Comments (0)
George Eliot, the chosen pen name of Mary Ann Evans (1819 – 1880), was an esteemed Victorian-era British author. Her writing was politically and socially perceptive and inventive.
Middlemarch, The Mill on the Floss, and Silas Marner are considered some of the finest and most important literary works in British literature. In addition to these and other novels, George Eliot also wrote poems, short stories, translations, and essays.
Middlemarch (1871) follows the tale of Dorothea Brooke and Tertius Lydgate, two characters destined to enter marriages that are not only unfulfilling, but also conflict with their personal aspirations. Read More→
By Aiyana Edmund | On August 3, 2018 | Updated December 7, 2020 | Comments (0)
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle was published in 1962, but not without its share of challenges. The following selection of quotes from A Wrinkle in Time prove that this beloved novel is a timeless work of fiction for all ages.
“A Wrinkle in Time was almost never published,” Madeleine L’Engle wrote. “You can’t name a major publisher who didn’t reject it. When we’d run through forty-odd publishers, my agent sent it back. We gave up.”
Editors found the fantasy novel too dark and complex for children, but of course, the book eventually found its home. Published in 1962, A Wrinkle in Time is still in print, with millions of copies sold worldwide. Read More→
By Aiyana Edmund | On July 6, 2018 | Updated February 11, 2024 | Comments (0)
Octavia E. Butler (1947 – 2006) was an American author of speculative, dystopian, and science fiction. In the white male-dominated field of science fiction, she broke ground as a Black woman writer in the genre. Following is a selection of quotes from Kindred, showcasing Octavia Butler’s keen observations of human nature.
After publishing some short stories, Octavia Butler’s first novel was Patternmaster (1976). It was the first in what would become a four-volume series. But it was Kindred (1979) that placed Octavia Butler firmly on the literary map.
The novel’s protagonist is Dana, a contemporary African-American woman who travels back in time to save an ancestor who happens to be a white slave owner. By saving him in his time, she ensures her own survival in the future. Read More→
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