The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads tagged with “books”

Barbara Walters on the Art of Conversation, How to Talk to Bores, and What Truman Capote Teaches Us About Being Interesting
Barbara Walters on the Art of Conversation, How to Talk to Bores, and What Truman Capote Teaches Us About Being Interesting

“Things being what they are in the world today, we are more and more driven to depend on one another’s sympathy and friendship in order to survive…”

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Leonard Cohen on Creativity, Work Ethic, and Why You Should Never Quit Before You Know What It Is You’re Quitting
Leonard Cohen on Creativity, Work Ethic, and Why You Should Never Quit Before You Know What It Is You’re Quitting

“The cutting of the gem has to be finished before you can see whether it shines.”

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The Art of Self-Renewal: The Pioneering Social Scientist John Gardner on How to Keep Your Work and Your Spirit Alive Over the Long Run
The Art of Self-Renewal: The Pioneering Social Scientist John Gardner on How to Keep Your Work and Your Spirit Alive Over the Long Run

“The self-renewing man … looks forward to an endless and unpredictable dialogue between his potentialities an the claims of life – not only the claims he encounters but the claims he invents.”

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How the Bees Gave Earth Its Splendid Colors
How the Bees Gave Earth Its Splendid Colors

How a striped, winged, six-legged love machine sparked “the longest marketing campaign in history.”

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David Bowie Answers the Famous Proust Questionnaire
David Bowie Answers the Famous Proust Questionnaire

“Q: What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? A: Living in fear.”

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Ray Bradbury on Failure, Why We Hate Work, and the Importance of Love in Creative Endeavors
Ray Bradbury on Failure, Why We Hate Work, and the Importance of Love in Creative Endeavors

How working for the wrong motives poisons our creativity and warps our ideas of success and failure.

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Swami Vivekananda on the Secret of Work: Intelligent Consolation for the Pressures of Productivity from 1896
Swami Vivekananda on the Secret of Work: Intelligent Consolation for the Pressures of Productivity from 1896

“Every work that we do… every thought that we think, leaves such an impression on the mind-stuff…”

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Mocha Dick: The Story of the Real-Life Whale That Inspired Moby-Dick, Illustrated
Mocha Dick: The Story of the Real-Life Whale That Inspired Moby-Dick, Illustrated

“Some men sat stone-faced. Some shook.”

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Chinua Achebe on the Meaning of Life and the Writer’s Responsibility in the World
Chinua Achebe on the Meaning of Life and the Writer’s Responsibility in the World

The difference between blind optimism and the urge to improve the world’s imperfection.

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30 Days of “Quantum Poetry” Celebrating the Glory of Science
30 Days of “Quantum Poetry” Celebrating the Glory of Science

From black holes to DNA to butterfly metamorphosis, bewitching verses on the magic of nature.

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