"Literati" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... precisely obscure, is unimportant. He came of a Honanese family who were nothing more distinguished than farmers possessing a certain amount of land, but not too much of the world's possessions. The boy probably ran wild in the field at an age when the sons of high officials and literati were already pale and anaemic from over-much study. To some such cause the man undoubtedly owed his powerful physique, his remarkable appetite, his general roughness. Native biographers state that as a youth he failed to pass his hsiu-tsai examinations—the lowest civil service degree—because ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... were piled a number of the small rolls of narrow manuscript with which the reader is familiar. These were a series of critical sketches entitled "The Literati of New York," by which he hoped to keep the pot boiling some days. Virginia was listening for a step on the stair, for she had written Mrs. Osgood a note that morning, begging her to come to them, and she knew that she would respond. The door opened ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... hands of the learned classes, and that these governing scholars found their salvation lay in suppressing all progressive ideas. The ideas behind the Boxer troubles and the outbreaks over the introduction of railroad and other foreign devil machinations have emanated from the minds of the literati, and been spread by their pamphlets ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... capitals, whose very iron railings are not free from gilt. Franklin was not less a lady's man, than a man's man, a wise man, and an old man. Not only did he enjoy the homage of the choicest Parisian literati, but at the age of seventy-two he was the caressed favorite of the highest born beauties of the Court; who through blind fashion having been originally attracted to him as a famous savan, were permanently retained as his admirers by his Plato-like graciousness of good ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... Some other fellow, eh? Well, if Shake is satisfied, I am. Do you know, Renny, I calculate that, line for line, I've written about ten times as much as Shakespeare. Do the literati recognize that fact? Not a bit of it. This is an ungrateful ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... poems that follow I have taken as my subjects certain designs of the so-called Uki-oye (or Passing World) school. These prints, made and produced for purely popular consumption by artists who, whatever their genius, were despised by the literati of their time, share at least one characteristic with Japanese poetry, which is, that they exalt the most trivial and commonplace subjects into the universal significance of works of art. And therefore I have chosen them ...
— Japanese Prints • John Gould Fletcher
... concealed by the monopolizing jealousy of the Spanish government. Pretending to have been the first discoverer of the continent of the New World, he presumptuously gave it the appellation of America after his own name; and the inconsiderate applause of the European literati has perpetuated this usurped denomination, instead of the legitimate name which the new quarter of the world ought to have received from that ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr
... keeping with their primitive surroundings. The profession offered no rewards sufficient to attract men of education or capacity. After a few months of desultory instruction young Abraham knew all that these vagrant literati could teach him. His last school-days were passed with one Swaney in 1826, who taught at a distance of four and a half miles from the Lincoln cabin. The nine miles of walking doubtless seemed to Thomas Lincoln a waste of time, and the lad was ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... moment; for the accents, in which she pronounced it, and the smile, that accompanied them, were a spell upon the judgment of the auditors. Her petits soupers were the most tasteful of any in Paris, and were frequented by many of the second class of literati. She was fond of music, was herself a scientific performer, and had frequently concerts at her house. Valancourt, who passionately loved music, and who sometimes assisted at these concerts, admired her execution, but remembered with a sigh the eloquent simplicity of Emily's songs and the ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... strange owners, almost always to be had for gold. To acquire these was Cotton's chief delight from the age of eighteen; and as a natural consequence, this taste surrounded him with learned friends. At his house at Westminster the literati of the day were wont to meet. Josceline, Camden, Noel, Speed, Sir John Davis, and others formed, together with himself, the then Society of Antiquaries, ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... is always singular. The nouns means, alms, and amends, though plural in form, may be either singular or plural in signification. Antipodes, credenda, literati, and minutiae are always plural. Bandit is now used as the singular ...
— English Grammar in Familiar Lectures • Samuel Kirkham
... that the Disciples of Christ wrote in Greek, whereas, in fact, they understood only Hebrew. It is now claimed that Greek was the language of Jerusalem at that time; that Hebrew had fallen into disuse; that no one understood it except the literati and the highly educated. If I fell into an error upon this point it was because I relied upon the New Testament. I find in the twenty-first chapter of the Acts an account of Paul having been mobbed in the city of Jerusalem; that he was protected by a Chief Captain and some soldiers; ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... by the little band I have mentioned of Northern literati, men not less tenacious, generally speaking, of their own fame and their own opinions, than the national regiments are supposed to be jealous of the high character which they have won upon service. ...
— The Monastery • Sir Walter Scott
... res omnino repudiaret, ne domesticis quidem exemplis docti numen deorum conprobabimus? Nihil nos P. Claudi bello Punico primo temeritas movebit, qui {10} etiam per iocum deos irridens, cum cavea literati pulli non pascerentur, mergi eos in aquam iussit, ut biberent, quoniam esse nollent? Qui risus, classe devicta, multas ipsi lacrimas, magnam populo Romano cladem attulit. Quid? Collega eius Iunius {15} eodem bello nonne tempestate classem amisit, cum auspiciis ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce
... genuine triumph than the sale of many editions. It went straight into the heart of the peasant, who understood and appreciated every scene and line. And it was discussed by all the Edinburgh clubs, and by the literati who knew their Theocritus and could write dissertations on pastoral poetry. The greatest poet could have hoped ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... was borrowed from the Greeks; but at first, the Latins called such persons literati. Cornelius Nepos, also, in his book, where he draws a distinction between a literate and a philologist, says that in common phrase, those are properly called literati who are skilled in speaking or writing with care ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus
... little, but thinking out his philosophical prose poem of "Eureka," which he deemed the crowning work of his life. His life was as abstemious and regular as his means were small. Gradually, however, as intercourse with fellow literati re-aroused his dormant energies, he began to meditate a fresh start in the world. His old and never thoroughly abandoned project of starting a magazine of his own, for the enunciation of his own views on literature, now absorbed all his thoughts. In order to get the necessary ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... well in such a company, it is extremely right to be in it sometimes, and you will be but more esteemed in other companies, for having a place in that. But then do not let it engross you; for if you do, you will be only considered as one of the 'literati' by profession; which is not the way either, to shine, ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... Coleridge that she was the greatest woman in England, and Coleridge looked her over with a philosopher's eye, and reported her favorably to Southey. In a letter to Cottle, Robert Southey says: "Of all the lions or literati I have seen here, Mary Imlay's countenance is the best, infinitely the best; the only fault in it is an expression somewhat similar to what the prints of Horne Tooke display—an expression indicating superiority; not haughtiness, not sarcasm, in Mary Imlay, but still it is ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... conclude: I am not quite sure but we ought to be angry at your taking these sort of hoaxing liberties with our literati; and I don't know but some of us will be making reprisals. What should you say to it in Germany if one of these days for example you were to receive a large parcel by the 'post-wagen' containing Posthumous Works of Mr. Kant. I won't swear but ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey
... society calling itself of the Honey-Bees and ostensibly devoted to the study of the classical poets, from whose pages the members were supposed to cull mellifluous nourishment; but under this guise the so-called literati had for some time indulged in free discussion of religious and scientific questions. The Academy of the Honey-Bees comprised among its members all the independent thinkers of Turin: doctors of law, of philosophy ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... common fault among the active men, the truly living, who could tell what life is. It should not be so. Literature should not be left to the mere literati—eloquence to the mere orator. Every Caesar should be able to write his own commentary. We want a more equal, more thorough, more harmonious development, and there is nothing to hinder from it the men of this country, except their ...
— Summer on the Lakes, in 1843 • S.M. Fuller
... THEOLOGY AND RELIGION.—Upon these subjects it is customary to find a mingling of contradictions. Leading New England literati, who inherit all the narrowness and self-sufficiency of British conservatism, are frequently impelled to utter expressions which would lead the reader to think them persons of liberal and progressive minds. Such expressions we find in the writings ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, June 1887 - Volume 1, Number 5 • Various
... The supercilious pride of Brahminism, or the lofty scorn of Mohammedanism, is quite equal to that self-sufficient Greek philosophy in whose eyes the Gospel was the merest foolishness. And the immovable self-righteousness of the Stoics has its counterpart in the Confucianism of the Chinese literati. A careful comparison of the six schools of Hindu philosophy with the various systems of Greece and Rome, will fill the mind with surprise at the numerous correspondences—one might almost say identities. ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... a variety of argument to prove that literary men are not Maecenased by either the government or aristocracy of Great Britain. He points out the advantages which the French literati have from their Institute, the ennoblements, the decorations, and pensions which they receive; and certainly makes out a ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... the 'belles-lettres' carry us any farther than the very fine 'letters' or litteral; while even Solomon So-so may take courage when he reflects (provided Solomon be ever guilty of reflecting) that the 'literati' have 'literally' nothing more profound about them than the knowledge of their 'letters.' The Latins were prolific in words of this kind; thus they had the literatus and the literator—making some such discrimination between them as we ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... reproduced in the present volume. A group of precocious Eton lads, Canning, J. Hookham Frere, John Smith, and Robert (Bobus) Smith, during the years 1786-1787 produced forty octavo numbers of a weekly paper called The Microcosm. They succeeded in exciting some interest among the literati,[7] were coming out in a "Second Edition" as early as the Christmas vacation of 1786,[8] and in the end sold their copyright for fifty pounds to their publisher, Charles Knight of Windsor.[9] Canning wrote Nos. XI and ...
— Parodies of Ballad Criticism (1711-1787) • William Wagstaffe
... sentiment and the sentimental alike. "Magazines of cleverness" have this for their keynote, although as yet the satire is not always well aimed. There are abundant signs that the generation just coming forward will rejoice in such a pose. It is observable now in the colleges, where the young literati turn up their noses at everything American,—magazines, best-sellers, or one-hundred-night plays,—and resort for inspiration to the English school of anti-Victorians: to Remy de Gourmont, to Anatole France. Their pose is not altogether ...
— Definitions • Henry Seidel Canby
... slaves; further, these advertisements swarm in many of the largest and most widely circulated political and commercial papers that are published in the slave states. The editors of those papers constitute the main body of the literati of the slave states; they move in the highest circle of society, are among the 'popular' men in the community, and as a class, are more influential than any other; yet these editors publish these advertisements with ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society |
