299 Quotes by Amor Towles

In the Age of Bronze, when a canny few discovered the science of metallurgy, how long did it take for them to fashion coins, crowns, and swords? That unholy trinity to which the common man was enslaved for the next one thousand years.

--You're rather well read for a working-class girl, she said with her back to me.--Really? I've found that all my well-read friends are from the working class.--Oh my. Why do you think that is? The purity of poverty?--No. It's just that reading is the cheapest form of entertainment.--Sex is the cheapest form of entertainment.--Not in this house.

Thus did the typewriters clack through the night, until that historic document had been crafted which guaranteed for all Russians freedom of conscience (Article 13), freedom of expression (Article 14), freedom of assembly (Article 15), and freedom to have any of these rights revoked should they be “utilized to the detriment of the socialist revolution (Article 23)!

When life makes it impossible for a man to pursue his dreams, he will connive to pursue them anyway.

...the tenure of friendships has never been governed by the passage of time.

When one turns seventeen and begins to experience that first period of real independence, one's senses are so alert, one's sentiments so finely attuned that every conversation, every look, every laugh may be writ indelibly upon one's memory. And the friends that one happens to make in those impressionable years? One will meet them forever after with a welling of affection.

For it is the role of the parent to express his concerns and then take three steps back. Not one, mind you, not two, but three. Or maybe four(But by no means five).

It is a sad but unavoidable fact of life," he began, "that as we age our social circles grow smaller. Whether from increased habit or diminished vigor, we suddenly find ourselves in the company of just a few familiar faces. So I view it as an incredible stroke of good fortune at this stage in my life to have found such a fine new friend.

[...]education will give you a sense of the world's scope, of its wonders, of its many and varied ways of life.