# The single greatest thing written by anyone, ever **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 3, 2008, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896 "2008-03-03T02:06:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Hamlet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hamlet/32/2818_2.png) [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2008, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/121 "2008-03-06T22:58:48Z")
There’s a lot of great stuff here. I’ll add my personal favorite: "OUT of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed. Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul." William Ernest Henley ---
**Author:** ![Crocodiles\_And\_Boulevards](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ee7513/32.png) [@Crocodiles\_And\_Boulevards](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crocodiles_And_Boulevards)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/122 "2008-03-07T02:33:56Z")
“All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.” Blaise Pascal The way that this quote ends has always stuck with me. ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/123 "2008-03-07T02:59:24Z")
One of my favorites, and the author is a woman: “All wars are sacred”, he said “to those who have to fight them. If the people who started wars didn’t make them sacred, who would be foolish enough to fight?” “But, no matter what rallying cries the orators give to the idiots who fight, no matter what noble purposes they assign to wars, there is never but one reason for a war. And that is money. All wars are in reality money squabbles, But so few people ever realize it. Their ears are too full of bugles and drums and fine words from stay-at-home orators.” "Sometimes the rallying cry is ‘Save the Tomb of Christ from the Heathen!’ Sometimes it’s ‘Down with Popery!’ and sometimes ‘Liberty!’ and sometimes ‘Cotton, Slavery and States’ Rights!’ ” - Rhett Butler, _Gone With the Wind_ ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/124 "2008-03-07T03:17:35Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam] My favorite Henry V passage my not be the greatest moment in literature but it is some eloquent cold blooded shit to say to someone before a beat down. I keep waiting for my ‘Jules moment’ but I guess I’ll have to become a hitman first. And tell the pleasant prince this mock of his Hath turn’d his balls to gun-stones; and his soul Shall stand sore charged for the wasteful vengeance That shall fly with them: for many a thousand widows Shall this his mock mock out of their dear husbands; Mock mothers from their sons, mock castles down; And some are yet ungotten and unborn That shall have cause to curse the Dauphin’s scorn. But this lies all within the will of God, To whom I do appeal; and in whose name Tell you the Dauphin I am coming on, To venge me as I may and to put forth My rightful hand in a well-hallow’d cause. So get you hence in peace; and tell the Dauphin His jest will savour but of shallow wit, When thousands weep more than did laugh at it. [/QUOTE] I know I already posted, but now I can’t resist adding _my_ favorite _Henry V_ passage: > [@](#): > > But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in a battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all, ‘We died at such a place’; some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afeard that there are few die well that die in a battle; for how can they charitably dispose of any thing, when blood is their argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it; whom to disobey were against all proportion of subjection. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/125 "2008-03-07T04:33:34Z")
A single stanza poem by [Roger McGough](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_McGough) entitled **On Picnics** : at the going down of the sun and in the morning I try to remember them but their names are ordinary names and their causes are thighbones tugged excitedly from the soil by frenchchildren on picnics. (hope it’s ok to post this – it’s hard to excerpt a one stanza poem But if it’s not ok, [here’s a link](http://www.andraste.org/lit/mcgough.html) to someone else’s reposting). 🙂 McGough’s poem probably resonates with me because the [Ode of Remembrance](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ode_of_Remembrance), from Binyon’s **For The Fallen** is so strongly associated here with ANZAC day. A related and poetic offering from the ANZAC memorial, written in 1934 by [Atatürk](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Kemal_Atat%C3%BCrk) (who was a divisional commander during the Gallipoli campaign): Those heroes that shed their blood And lost their lives… You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore, rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies And the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side, Here in this country of ours. You, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries… Wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom And are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land, they have Become our sons as well. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/126 "2008-03-07T09:01:44Z")
And in kind reply, the wonderful poem at the Ataturk Memorial in Canberra: Heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives… you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours… You the mothers who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. Having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well. ---
**Author:** ![Quint](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/76d3ee/32.png) [@Quint](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quint)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/127 "2008-03-07T09:39:21Z")
[QUOTE=Paul in Saudi] And in kind reply, the wonderful poem at the Ataturk Memorial in Canberra: Heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives… you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours… You the mothers who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. Having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well. [/QUOTE] Holy shit. I think you win, that is so incredibly moving. Beautiful. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/128 "2008-03-07T14:39:10Z")
[QUOTE=fessie] One of my favorites, and the author is a woman: “All wars are sacred”, he said “to those who have to fight them. If the people who started wars didn’t make them sacred, who would be foolish enough to fight?” “But, no matter what rallying cries the orators give to the idiots who fight, no matter what noble purposes they assign to wars, there is never but one reason for a war. And that is money. All wars are in reality money squabbles, But so few people ever realize it. Their ears are too full of bugles and drums and fine words from stay-at-home orators.” "Sometimes the rallying cry is ‘Save the Tomb of Christ from the Heathen!’ Sometimes it’s ‘Down with Popery!’ and sometimes ‘Liberty!’ and sometimes ‘Cotton, Slavery and States’ Rights!’ ” - Rhett Butler, _Gone With the Wind_ [/QUOTE] **fessie** , it may be just that I’ve read it six hundred times, but to me GWTW has a _flow_ all the way through it, like a song or a poem. One of my all time favorite books. Mine is the opening paragraph of The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson. > [@](#): > > No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/129 "2008-03-07T15:39:23Z")
I ran across a quote I loved in **So Long and Thanks for All the Fish** recently. A bit of a lighter tone than most of this thread: > [@](#): > > There is a feeling which persists in England that making a sandwich interesting, attractive, or in any way pleasant to eat is something sinful that only foreigners do. > > “Make 'em dry” is the instruction buried somewhere in the collective national consciousness, “make 'em rubbery. If you have to keep the buggers fresh, do it by washing 'em once a week.” > > It is by eating sandwiches in pubs at Saturday lunchtime that the British seek to atone for whatever their national sins have been. They’re not altogether clear what those sins are, and don’t want to know either. Sins are not the sort of things one wants to know about. But whatever sins there are are amply atoned for by the sandwiches they make themselves eat. > > If there is anything worse than the sandwiches, it is the sausages which sit next to them. Joyless tubes, full of gristle, floating in a sea of something hot and sad, stuck with a plastic pin in the shape of a chef’s hat: a memorial, one feels, for some chef who hated the world, and died, forgotten and alone among his cats on a back stair in Stepney. > > The sausages are for the ones who know what their sins are and wish to atone for something specific. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/130 "2008-03-07T15:57:00Z")
Speaking of Ataturk, the thing that really intrigues me is not simply the quote that both **Apollyon** and **Paul of Saudi** have mentioned, as remarkable as it is; but also his other famous words associated with Gallipoli: > [@](#): > > Men, I am not ordering you to attack. I am ordering you to die. In the time that it takes us to die, other forces and commanders can come and take our place. It is the juxtaposition of both those sentiments from the same man (Although separated by twenty years of time.) that truly intrigues me. Either one alone would be remarkable, as I’ve said. That the same man could make both statements, hints at someone I want to know better. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/131 "2008-03-07T17:42:57Z")
I’ve always loved this passage from Ray Bradbury: > [@](#): > > Don’t you hear them pass? hover? dance their language? telling where all the sweet gums are, the syrups that make bears frolic and lumber in bulked ecstasies, that make boys squirm with unpronounced juices, that make girls leap out of beds to catch from the corners of their eyes their dolphin selves naked aflash on the warm air poised forever in one eternal glass wave. (“I Sing the Body Electric”) ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/132 "2008-03-07T18:39:25Z")
[QUOTE=Dung Beetle] Mine is the opening paragraph of The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson. [/QUOTE] Heh, check this out: > **[Great Literary Real Estate Ads](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=440563)** > > Hill House - For sale by owner - Motivated Seller!!! $2,995,000 Hill House, not sane, stands by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it has stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continue upright,... 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2008, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/133 "2008-03-07T18:50:06Z")
I would so be there…but I have to look after my poor sickly mother and my sister and her husband seem to think they own the car, though I helped them pay for it. May a rain of stones fall on their roof! ---
**Author:** ![ianzin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed655f/32.png) [@ianzin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ianzin)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2008, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/134 "2008-03-08T00:00:50Z")
Two glittering gems. "What about the main thing in life, all its riddles? If you want, I’ll spell it out for you right now. Do not pursue what is illusory, property and position: all that is gained at the expense of your nerves decade after decade, and is confiscated in one fell night. Live with a steady superiority over life - don’t be afraid of misfortune, and do not yearn after happiness; it is, after all, all the same: the bitter doesn’t last forever, and the sweet never fills the cup to overflowing. It is enough if you don’t freeze in the cold and if thirst and hunger don’t claw at your insides. If your back isn’t broken, if your feet can walk, if both arms can bend, if both eyes see, and if both ears hear, then whom should you envy? And why? Our envy of others devours us most of all. Rub your eyes and purify your heart - and prize above all else in the world those who love you and who wish you well. Do not hurt them or scold them, and never part from any of them in anger; after all, you simply do not know: it might be your last act before your arrest, and that will be how you will be imprinted in their memory. " - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn from “The Gulag Archipelago” “Ignite a candle of love in every meeting, and with tenderness rejoice and cheer ye every heart. Care for the stranger as for one of your own; show to alien souls the same loving kindness ye bestow upon your faithful friends. Should any come to blows with you, seek to be friends with him; should any stab you to the heart, be ye a healing salve unto his sores; should any taunt and mock at you, meet him with love. Should any heap his blame upon you, praise ye him; should he offer you a deadly poison, give him the choicest honey in exchange; and should he threaten your life, grant him a remedy that will heal him evermore. Should he be pain itself, be ye his medicine; should he be thorns, be ye his roses and sweet herbs. Perchance such ways and words from you will make this darksome world turn bright at last; will make this dusty earth turn heavenly, this devilish prison place become a royal palace of the Lord - so that war and strife will pass and be no more, and love and trust will pitch their tents on the summits of the world.” – Bah’ai faith prayer. ---
**Author:** ![Linty\_Fresh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Linty\_Fresh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Linty_Fresh)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2008, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/135 "2008-03-08T00:14:14Z")
For me, the single greatest thing would have to be Franz Kafka’s [Before the Law](http://www.mala.bc.ca/~johnstoi/kafka/beforethelaw.htm), although it sounds a lot better in [the original German](http://www.braungardt.com/Literature/Kafka/Gesetz.htm). I’m not very well read, generally speaking, but Kafka introduced me to the existentionalist novel, and this exerpt from **The Trial** has stayed with me for the 20 years or so since I’ve read it. I really wouldn’t go so far as to call Kipling’s **Kim** the single greatest thing overwritten as a whole, but quite a bit of prose stands out as beautiful. The part where he describes the Grand Trunk Road makes me come back to the novel every few months. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2008, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/136 "2008-03-08T00:22:43Z")
[QUOTE=IvoryTowerDenizen] My contribution: The Sh’ma Hear O Israel, the Lord our G-D, the Lord is one. [/QUOTE] You say the Shema in English? My contribution: [QUOTE=P.G. Wodehouse] It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them [/QUOTE] On a more personal level, I’ve always loved the sentence below (from _Glimpses of World History_, by Jawaharlal Nehru) because it describes me perfectly: > [@](#): > > I have become a queer mixture of the East and the West, out of place everywhere, at home nowhere. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2008, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/137 "2008-03-08T00:30:49Z")
[QUOTE=Really Not All That Bright] On a more personal level, I’ve always loved the sentence below (from _Glimpses of World History_, by Jawaharlal Nehru) because it describes me perfectly: > [@](#): > > I have become a queer mixture of the East and the West, out of place everywhere, at home nowhere. [/QUOTE] Reminds me of a quote from Gustav Mahler: “I am three times homeless: as a Bohemian in Austria, as an Austrian among Germans, and as a Jew in the world.” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2008, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/138 "2008-03-08T00:32:26Z")
[QUOTE=Biffy the Elephant Shrew] Reminds me of a quote from Gustav Mahler: “I am three times homeless: as a Bohemian in Austria, as an Austrian among Germans, and as a Jew in the world.” [/QUOTE] That’s pretty much my story- I’m an Englishman of Indian parentage who lives in America; wherever I am, the grass is always greener in the other two. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2008, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/139 "2008-03-09T15:43:38Z")
The only things known to go faster than ordinary light is monarchy, according to the philosopher Ly Tin Weedle. He reasoned like this: you can’t have more than one king, and tradition demands that there is no gap between kings, so when a king dies the succession must therefore pass to the heir instantaneously. Presumably, he said, there must be some elementary particles – kingons, or possibly queons – that do this job, but of course succession sometimes fails if, in mid-flight, they strike an anti-particle, or republicon. His ambitious plans to use his discovery to send messages, involving the careful torturing of a small king in order to modulate the signal, were never fully expanded because, at that point, the bar closed. -Terry Pratchett. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2008, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/140 "2008-03-09T15:49:11Z")
A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down your pants. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896.md?page=8)