Category: Lit & Crit

“A heavy heart bears not a nimble tongue.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost 5.2

“Folly in fools bears not so strong a note as foolery in the wise, when wit doth dote.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost 5.2

“The blood of youth burns not with such excess as gravity’s revolt to wantonness.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost 5.2

“None are so surely caught, when they are catch’d, as wit turn’d fool: folly, in wisdom hatch’d, hath wisdom’s warrant, and the help of school, and wit’s own grace to grace a learned fool.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, 5.2

“A light heart lives long.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, 5.2

“Fat paunches have lean pates; and dainty bits make rich the ribs, but bankrupt quite the wits.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, 1.1

“Let fame, that all hunt after in their lives, live register’d upon our brazen tombs, and then grace us in the disgrace of death; when, spite of cormorant devouring time, the endeavour of this present breath may buy that honour which shall bate his scythe’s keen edge, and make us heirs of all eternity.” – William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, 1.1

“[O]ne spectacular new air weapon, a drone bomb, was tested against Japanese targets . . . . The drones, specially built planes capable of carrying a 2,000-pound bomb, were radio controlled by torpedo bombers of a special naval test unit. Synchronized television screens in drone and control planes enabled the controllers to view what was ahead of the drones and to crash them against point targets. After test attacks . . . . [t]he results were inconclusive. . . . [T]here was a future for this weapon, but . . . it needed more development work and better aircraft.” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part VI, Conclusion”

“The days passed in a blur. Every day we sent the Zeros up on frantic interception flights. The young and inexperienced student pilots had become battle-hardened veterans, their faces showing the sudden realization of death all about them. Not for a moment did the Americans ease their relentless pressure. Day and night the bombers came to pound Rabaul, to smash at the airfield and shipping in the harbor, while the fighters screamed low in daring strafing passes, shooting up anything they considered a worthwhile target.” – Commander Masatake Okumiya (quoted in Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”)

“One of the major points which has too often been overlooked in an evaluation of fighting power, but which determined to a large extent the efficiency of air units, was that of hygienic installations. Japanese engineers paid scant attention to this problem, dismissing the pressing matter of mosquito protection by simply rigging mosquito nets in personnel quarters. Sanitary facilities were basically crude and ineffective; certainly they contributed nothing to the morale of ground and air crews. The Americans, by contrast, swept clean vast areas surrounding their ground installations with advanced mechanical aids. Through exhaustive disinfecting operations, they banished flies and mosquitos from their airbases and paid similar attention to every phase of sanitation and disease. Some may consider this a prosaic matter, but it was vital to the men forced to live on desert islands and in the midst of jungles swarming with disease and insect life. The inevitable outcome of such neglect was a tremendous difference in the health of the American and Japanese personnel who were assigned to these forward air facilities.” – Commander Terufumi Kofukuda (quoted in Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”)

“Fighter pilot or bomber crewman, the Japanese naval flyer who fought at Rabaul was aware that he was waging a losing battle. The plane he flew was a torch, waiting only an incendiary bullet to set it alight. The gaping holes in his unit left by the death of veterans were filled by young, inexperienced replacements, more a liability than an asset in combat air operations. Despite the handicaps under which he fought—out-numbered, out-gunned, and out-flown—the enemy flyers fought, tenaciously right up to the day when Rabaul was abandoned to its ground defenders.” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”

“The [Japanese] pilots who began the war averaged 800 hours of flying time, and many of them had combat experience in China. Relatively few of these men survived until the end of 1943; a great many died at Coral Sea and Midway and in air battles over Guadalcanal.” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”

“There was no [Japanese] plane that flew from Rabaul that was not a potential flaming death trap to its crew. To meet the specifications outlined by the Japanese Navy, aircraft designers sacrificed safety to achieve maneuverability in fighters and long range in bombers.” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”

“Much of the plane [Mitsubishi ‘Betty’] was built of lightweight magnesium, a very inflammable metal, and in the wing roots and body between were poorly protected fuel and oil tanks. The result was a highly vulnerable aircraft so prone to burst into flames when hit that Japanese aircrews nicknamed it ‘Type 1 Lighter.’” – Henry I. Shaw, Jr., and Major Douglas T. Kane, USMC, Isolation of Rabaul, History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Vol. II, “Part V, Marine Air Against Rabaul”

“Our purses shall be proud, our garments poor; for ‘tis the mind that makes the body rich; and as the sun breaks through the darkest clouds, so honour peereth in the meanest habit.” – William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, 4.3

“Nothing comes amiss, so money comes withal.” – William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, 1.2

“No profit grows where is no pleasure ta’en.” – William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, 1.1

“Frame your mind to mirth and merriment, which bars a thousand harms and lengthens life.” – William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, Induction.2

“Lambs go to slaughter. A man, he learns when to walk away.” – David Simon and Ed Burns, “Port in a Storm, The Wire

“No one need know what I do in my dreams, and nothing’s wrong with little secret pleasures.” – Ovid: The Metamorphoses, trans. Horace Gregory

“If one does fail, there’s a touch of glory in having tried at all.” – Ovid: The Metamorphoses, trans. Horace Gregory

“An idiot holds his bauble for a god, and keeps the oath which by that god he swears.” – William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus 5.1

“The eagle suffers little birds to sing, and is not careful what they mean thereby, knowing that with the shadow of his wing he can at pleasure stint their melody.” – William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus 4.4

“Sorrow concealed, like an oven stopp’d, doth burn the heart to cinders where it is.” – William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus 2.4

“To ask a novelist to talk about his novels is like asking somebody to cook about their dancing. All you get is a bad omelette and a worse tango.” – Jim Crace (interviewed by Adam Begley), “The Art of Fiction,” Paris Review

“Vocabulary is the Trojan horse that smuggles the lie. Facts don’t help. If you’re not a persuasive talker at a party, no one’s going to believe you, even if everything you say is true. But if you’re a persuasive liar then everyone is fooled.” – Jim Crace (interviewed by Adam Begley), “The Art of Fiction,” Paris Review

“It easeth some, though none it ever cur’d, to think their dolour others have endur’d.” – William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece

“Short time seems long in sorrow’s sharp sustaining. Though woe be heavy, yet it seldom sleeps; and they that watch see time how slow it creeps.” – William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece

“Princes are the glass, the school, the book, where subjects’ eyes do learn, do read, do look.” – William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece

“Who buys a minute’s mirth to wail a week? Or sells eternity to get a toy? For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy?” – William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece