Arthur Smith Quotes

A memory is what is left when something happens and does not completely unhappen.

I remember everything, even the dates. But I don't want others to remember the details, just the image.

I have a hard time recalling the titles of books.

I have an excellent memory - for books and authors, that is. I remember all the books I've read.

The secret of a good memory is attention, and attention to a subject depends upon our interest in it. We rarely forget that which has made a deep impression on our minds.

Memory is not wisdom; idiots can by rote repeat volumes. Yet what is wisdom without memory?

You can't really say what is beautiful about a place, but the image of the place will remain vividly with you.

Memory is more indelible than ink.

I don't remember titles of books or authors from when I was young. I remember the title of only one book, which was 'The Timber Toes.' I remember it was a family of little wooden people who lived in the woods, and for some reason that stayed with me.

I divide all readers into two classes: those who read to remember and those who read to forget.

The reason a writer writes a book is to forget a book and the reason a reader reads one is to remember it.

When you learn a thing, try to use it sufficiently often not to forget it!

Some people have quick retention. I'm not one of those.

Try this experiment: Pick a famous movie - 'Casablanca,' say - and summarize the plot in one sentence. Is that plot you just described the thing you remember most about it? Doubtful. Narrative is a necessary cement, but it disappears from memory.

I don't forget nothing. It's a vault up here.

I retain characters more often than plot, but what seems to happen is that I latch on to specific moments, turns of phrase, and dialogue as touchstones for me to recall what happened in the book. Kind of like freeze-frame.

I know a lot of writers who tell me they 'always' knew how to read. They can't remember a time before reading. And those writers make me want to tear my hair out.

Most people remember the ending of the book more than the beginning and the middle.

Nothing important is learned; it is simply remembered.

When reading a book, be very certain that you never go past a word you do not fully understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he or she has gone past a word that was not understood.

What is that unforgettable line?

Memory is a capricious and arbitrary creature. You never can tell what pebble she will pick up from the shore of life to keep among her treasures, or what inconspicuous flower of the field she will preserve as the symbol of "thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." . . . And yet I do not doubt that the most Important things are always the best remembered.

Why is it that we are born remembering, and live forgetting?

Surely few if any readers have come across the sentence they are now reading, and someone who had by chance heard or seen it could not possibly remember such a fact.

People sometimes forget when you remember, but they always remember when you forget.