What is your favorite opening line of a book?
- Thread starter Alakaizer
- Start date
William S. Burroughs had a bunch of good ones. Unfortunately I don't have them on me and can't remember them well enough to quote them.
Edit: Naked Lunch
I can feel the heat closing in, feel them out there making their moves, setting up their devil doll stool pigeons, crooning over my spoon and dropper I throw away at Washington Square Station, vault a turnstile and two flights down the iron stairs, catch an uptown A train?Young, good looking , crew cut Ivy League advertising exec type fruit holds the door back for me
Edit: Naked Lunch
I can feel the heat closing in, feel them out there making their moves, setting up their devil doll stool pigeons, crooning over my spoon and dropper I throw away at Washington Square Station, vault a turnstile and two flights down the iron stairs, catch an uptown A train?Young, good looking , crew cut Ivy League advertising exec type fruit holds the door back for me
"It was hot, the night we burned Chrome."
From "Burning Chrome," a short story by William Gibson. (Okay, I cheated a bit, since it's not really a novel.)
From "Burning Chrome," a short story by William Gibson. (Okay, I cheated a bit, since it's not really a novel.)
That is such a great book.Valiance said:
OT: Mine would be...
"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking Thirteen." - Nineteen Eighty Four.
Or
"The sweat wis lashing oafay Sick Boy; he wis trembling. Ah wis jist sitting thair, focusing oan the telly, tryin no tae notice the ****. He wis bringing me doon." - Trainspotting.
It is a truth universally accepted that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains. - Pride & Prejudice & Zombies.
"Call me Ishmael." - Moby Dick.
"Call me Ishmael." - Moby Dick.
The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose...
Here are a couple I like...
From The Book of General Ignorance, Stephen Fry's foreword is pretty good.
'People sometimes accuse me of knowing a lot. "Stephen," they say, "you know a lot".' (Pretty typical Stephen Fry, really)
From A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
'What's it going to be then, ey?'
There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, Dim being really dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening, a flip dark chill winter bastard through dry.
I read A Clockwork Orange before seeing the movie, but I very nearly didn't after reading that line. All I could thing was 'what in the bloody hell did that mean??!!'
From The Book of General Ignorance, Stephen Fry's foreword is pretty good.
'People sometimes accuse me of knowing a lot. "Stephen," they say, "you know a lot".' (Pretty typical Stephen Fry, really)
From A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
'What's it going to be then, ey?'
There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, Dim being really dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening, a flip dark chill winter bastard through dry.
I read A Clockwork Orange before seeing the movie, but I very nearly didn't after reading that line. All I could thing was 'what in the bloody hell did that mean??!!'
"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger
by Stephen King
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger
by Stephen King