Famous opening lines (1 Viewer)

[Ozymandias]

Obviously "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..." is first on the list.

Also, "Call me Ishmael."

But my personal favorite is: "There is a lovely road which runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it."

 

[wadegarrett]

“I believe in America.”

The Godfather

 

[Jaysus]

Does "Shut that #### up before I ####start her head" count?

 

[John Maddens Lunchbox]

ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE is scrawled in blood red lettering on the side of the Chemical Bank near the corner of Eleventh and First and is in print large enough to be seen from the backseat of the cab as it lurches forward in the traffic leaving Wall Street and just as Timothy Price notices the words a bus pulls up, the advertisement for Les Miserables on its side blocking his view, but Price who is with Pierce & Pierce and twenty-six doesn't seem to care because he tells the driver he will give him five dollars to turn up the radio, "Be My Baby" on WYNN, and the driver, black, not American, does so.

 

[Gadabout]

Does "Shut that #### up before I ####start her head" count?

Not really, but it's the first thing I thought of.

 

[Black Label Society]

"Hey, let me get an opinion on something, but I can't stay long......."

 

[John Maddens Lunchbox]

No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were being scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.

 

[Black Box]

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." - The Hobbit

Though I think we might get different answers if there were more women on the boards.

For example, I think the opening line in Pride and Prejudice is pretty famous, but I don't know what it is.

 

[wildbill]

In the beginning...

 

[pantagrapher]

"Money." —JR

"Justice." —A Frolic of His Own

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins."—Lolita

"I was the shadow of the waxwing slain."—Pale Fire

 

[Ozymandias]

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit."

Though I think we might get different answers if there were more women on the boards.

For example, I think the opening line in Pride and Prejudice is pretty famous, but I don't know what it is.

Something like: (I am quoting from memory) "it is a truth universally accepted that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

 

[John Maddens Lunchbox]

There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova milkbar sold milk-plus, milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence.”

 

[Black Box]

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit."

Though I think we might get different answers if there were more women on the boards.

For example, I think the opening line in Pride and Prejudice is pretty famous, but I don't know what it is.

Something like: (I am quoting from memory) "it is a truth universally accepted that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

That is ringing some bells.

 

[Mr. Ected]

My story? Okay. It was never easy for me. I was born a poor black child. I remember the days, sittin' on the porch with my family, singin' and dancin' down in Mississippi.

 

[John Maddens Lunchbox]

“My name is Lester Burnham. This is my neighborhood; this is my street; this is my life. I am 42 years old; in less than a year I will be dead. Of course I don't know that yet, and in a way, I am dead already.”

Well that gave away the ending

 

[Ozymandias]

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit."

Though I think we might get different answers if there were more women on the boards.

For example, I think the opening line in Pride and Prejudice is pretty famous, but I don't know what it is.

Something like: (I am quoting from memory) "it is a truth universally accepted that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

That is ringing some bells.

I almost had it right. "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

 

[Megla]

"A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.…",

 

[D_House]

"Money." —JR

"Justice." —A Frolic of His Own



"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins."—Lolita

"I was the shadow of the waxwing slain."—Pale Fire

 

[TheAristocrat]

"If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."

-Catcher in the Rye

 

[yinzer]

This thread would be much cooler if more than 1 out of 10 people said what movie their quote was from

 

[Pooch]

"Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show." - David Copperfield

 

[Uncle Humuna]

Call me Jonah.

 

[Limp Ditka]

Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family, Choose a ####### big television, Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players, and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol and dental insurance. Choose fixed-interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisure wear and matching luggage. Choose a three piece suite on hire purchase in a range of ####### fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing ####### junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing you last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, ####ed-up brats you have spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life.

But who would I want to do a thing like that?

I chose not to choose life: I chose something else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who need reasons when you've got heroin?

 

[whoknew]

"All of this happened, more or less." - Slaughterhouse-Five

 

[jb1020]

"Way out west there was this fella I wanna tell ya about. Goes by the name of Jeff Lebowski. At least that was the handle his loving parents gave him, but he never had much use for it himself. See, this Lebowski, he called himself 'The Dude.'

really need the title?

 

[Reg Lllama of Brixton]

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since.

"Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."

 

[Reg Lllama of Brixton]

It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

 

[pantagrapher]

When I stepped out into the bright sunlight, from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman and a ride home....

 

[saintfool]

One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug.

Kafka's Metamorphosis

 

[Uncle Humuna]

This would make for a fun Friday game.

Name the book/movie from the opening line . . .

 

[Reg Lllama of Brixton]

When I stepped out into the bright sunlight, from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman and a ride home....

Stay gold, pantaboy...stay gold.

 

[pantagrapher]

One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug.

Kafka's Metamorphosis

Which translation? Just curious. I've never seen it phrased that way.

 

[Chaka]

Ain't life a #####? :BAM: - The Last Boyscout

 

[saintfool]

One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug.

Kafka's Metamorphosis

Which translation? Just curious. I've never seen it phrased that way.

i have no idea. pulled it from Project Gutenberg. is it the "verminous"part? i've read that some of the newer translations are trying to stress the authenticity of his words and phrasing...

 

[TheAristocrat]

"Who is John Galt?"

 

[Sabertooth]

As far back as I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster.

 

[NFLJUNKEY]

No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were being scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.

HG Wells fan, eh? War of the Worlds is one of my favs... (and just helping the guy who wants the titles revealed)

 

[pantagrapher]

One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug.

Kafka's Metamorphosis

Which translation? Just curious. I've never seen it phrased that way.

i have no idea. pulled it from Project Gutenberg. is it the "verminous"part? i've read that some of the newer translations are trying to stress the authenticity of his words and phrasing...

Yeah. I've seen beetle, bug, insect, roach etc., but I'd never seen that.

 

[GregR_2]

"The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there." - The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley

"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." - Anna Karenina by Tolstoy

"I write this sitting in the kitchen sink." - I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

"In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly-fishing," - A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean

"The sky above the port was the color of television tuned to a dead channel." - Neuromancer by William Gibson

"It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on earth has ever produced the expression, 'as pretty as an airport'." - The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul by Douglas Adams

"This is my favorite book in all the world, though I have never read it." - The Princess Bride by William Goldman

"At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since." - The Secret Life of Salvador Dali by Salvador Dali

"The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new." - Murphy by Samuel Beckett

"It was like so, but wasn't." - Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers

"They shoot the white girl first." - Paradise by Toni Morrison

"Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board." - Their Eyes Were Watching God

"There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it." - The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

"It was a pleasure to burn." - Farenheit 451 by Rady Bradbury

"In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since." - The Great Gatbsy by F. Scott Fitzgerald

 

[Gadabout]

Suicide never really seemed like an option. Neither did this murderous rampage I was soon to embark on.

 

[Parmcat]

Are you sitting comfortibly.....then we'll begin

If music be the food of love, then play on...

 

[GregR_2]

"This picture takes place in Paris in those wonderful days when a siren was a brunette and not an alarm --- and if a Frenchman turned out the light, it was not on account of an air raid." - Ninotchka

"Rosebud." - Citizen Kane

"We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold" - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

""As far back as I can remember, I've always wanted to be a gangster." - Goodfellas

"Can I help you?"

—I'd like to see the man in charge."

—"In here . . ."

—"I want to report a murder."

—"Sit down. Where was the murder committed?"

—"San Francisco, last night."

—"Who was murdered?"

—"I was."

- D.O.A

"People are always asking me if I know Tyler Durden." - Fight Club

 

[jb1020]

seriously, no one is listing the movies?

 

[Abrantes]

"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." - Anna Karenina by Tolstoy

Definitely one of my favorites.

 

[GregR_2]

"Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea." - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

"The story so far. In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move." - The Restaurant at the End of the Universe by Douglas Adams

"The regular early morning yell of horror was the sound of Arthur Dent waking up and suddenly remembering where he was." - Life, The Universe, and Everything by Douglas Adams

 

[The Hardline]

I am not a bum. I'm a jerk. I once had wealth...power...and the love of a beautiful woman. Now I only have two things...my friends...and...my thermos.

My story? Okay. It was never easy for me. I was born a poor black child. I remember the days...sitting on the porch with my family...singing and dancing...down in Mississippi.

 

[TommyGilmore]

"What's it gonna be, Angelina?"

 

[DaVinci]

"It was a dark and stormy night." - untitled novel by Snoopy

 

[Bonzai]

Mother died today. Or perhaps it was yesterday, I don’t know.

 

[crnerblitz]

When shall We three meet again, in thunder, in lightning, or in rain?