# Favorite First Lines **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 7, 2008, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882 "2008-10-07T18:48:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Arglefraster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@Arglefraster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arglefraster)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/1 "2008-10-07T18:48:28Z")
Inspired by the Favorite Last Lines thread, what are your favorite first lines of a book or movie? Here’s mine, from Pigs Don’t Fly by Mary Brown. “My mother was the village whore, and I loved her very much.” ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/2 "2008-10-07T19:04:38Z")
“Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.” ---
**Author:** ![Mahna\_Mahna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47c2d/32.png) [@Mahna\_Mahna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahna_Mahna)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/3 "2008-10-07T19:06:14Z")
I think it’s hard to top the first sentence in _The Thought Gang_ by Tibor Fischer. > [@](#): > > The only advice I can offer, should you wake up vertiginously in a strange flat, with thoroughly installed hangover, without any of your clothing, without any recollection of how you got there, with the police sledgehammering down the door to the accompaniment of excited dogs, while you are surrounded by bales of lavishly-produced magazines featuring children in adult acts, the only advice I can offer you is to try to be good-humoured and polite. (the rest of the book is equally awesome, BTW) ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/4 "2008-10-07T19:08:02Z")
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” Along with… “Aujourd’hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas.” ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/5 "2008-10-07T19:13:13Z")
“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderlay again.” ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/6 "2008-10-07T19:14:39Z")
“Sooner or later, it was bound to happen.” ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/7 "2008-10-07T19:17:11Z")
“Saigon…shit.” ---
**Author:** ![Rebo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rebo/32/13005_2.png) [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/8 "2008-10-07T19:25:37Z")
“The dark man fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” Swallowed me right up, it did. ---
**Author:** ![Ol\_Gaffer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Ol\_Gaffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ol_Gaffer)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/9 "2008-10-07T19:32:25Z")
the usual… “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” and, "We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. " ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/10 "2008-10-07T20:32:44Z")
Another fan of “The Man in Black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” _Sten_ : “Death came quietly to the Row” ---
**Author:** ![well\_he\_s\_back](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/3ab097/32.png) [@well\_he\_s\_back](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/well_he_s_back)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/11 "2008-10-07T20:56:09Z")
Reality Chuck and Ol Gaffer got mine, all three of them, dagnabit ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/12 "2008-10-07T21:00:15Z")
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/13 "2008-10-07T21:05:42Z")
Do dedicatory poems or prologues, (if both of which are fictional) count as “first lines”? Cause I’m writing a novel with a kickass first line but before every chapter I have an intentionally mediocre dedicatory poem. I wouldn’t want to be remembered for “The child shall grow up to save them from hatred and cheesesteak” 🙂 And that would also disqualify my favorite first line: _Lolita_. ---
**Author:** ![trapezoidal\_jellyfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6f9a4e/32.png) [@trapezoidal\_jellyfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/trapezoidal_jellyfish)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/14 "2008-10-07T21:38:26Z")
for those of us who are not quite so well read, can people write what books these are from? ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/15 "2008-10-07T21:58:43Z")
> [@villa](#): > > “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” > > Along with… > > “Aujourd’hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas.” Sorry… the first is 1984, the second L’Etranger, by Albert Camus; it translates as “Mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I’m not sure.” ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/16 "2008-10-07T22:05:53Z")
“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” -Neruomancer. I like the quote both because its a good opening in and of itself, and because I’m also amused by how changes in technology have changed its meaning. Tune your TV to a dead channel these days, and your more then likely to be looking at a pleasant sky blue. The next generation will totally misunderstand what Gibson was trying to say. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/17 "2008-10-07T22:33:27Z")
“At first, Potiphar Breen did not notice the girl taking her clothes off…” ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/18 "2008-10-07T22:57:51Z")
“It was love at first sight.” Catch-22 ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/19 "2008-10-07T23:23:41Z")
Rough paraphrase: There once was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb and he almost deserved it. C.S. Lewis The Silver Chair. (Narnia IV, orthodox version) ---
**Author:** ![Ol\_Gaffer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Ol\_Gaffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ol_Gaffer)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/20 "2008-10-07T23:24:10Z")
> [@Ol\_Gaffer](#): > > the usual… > > “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” > > and, > > "We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. " The first is from The Hobbit by Tolkien, the second is from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882.md?page=2)