Famous First Lines
Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.
 
 

- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
It was a pleasure to burn.
 
 

- Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
The primroses were over.
 
 

- Richard Adams, Watership Down

 
Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, `and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice `without pictures or conversation?'
 
 

- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

The drought had lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended. Here on the Equator, in the continent which would one day be known as Africa, the battle for existence had reached a new climax of ferocity, and the victor was not yet in sight.
 
 

- Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey

In a village of La Mancha the name of which have no desire to recall, there lived not so long ago one of those gentlemen who always have a lance in the rack, an ancient buckler, a skinny nag, and a greyhound for the chase.
 
 

- Cervantes (Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra) Don Quixote
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.
 

- Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
If you want to find Cherry Tree Lane all you have to do is ask a policeman at the crossroads.
 
 

P.L. Travers, Mary Poppins
The great fish moved silently through the night water, propelled by short sweeps of its crescent tail.
 
 

Peter Benchley, Jaws
"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect."
 

 Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis
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 anyone," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."
 

- F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
A squat grey building of only thirty-four stories. Over the main entrance the words, CENTRAL LONDON HATCHERY AND CONDITIONING CENTRE, and in a shield, the World State's motto, COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY.
 
 

- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it.
 
 

Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith, his chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the glass doors of Victory Mansions, though not quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust from entering along with him.
 
 

- George Orwell, 1984
When shall we three meet again
In thunder, lightning, or in rain?
 

- William Shakespeare, Macbeth
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair ..."
 

Charles Dickens, The Tale of Two Cities
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
 
 

- William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
"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."
 

J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings.
 

- Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein
In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.
 
 

- J.R.R. Tolkien (John Ronald Reuel Tolkien), The Hobbit