Favorite first lines

[Steerpike]

Of these, I like the Austen and Tolstoy best:

10 of Our Favorite First Lines in Literature

What are some of your favorite first lines?

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

I've never read Neuromancer, but I love the first line. It makes me want to read it...which I guess is the idea.

 

[Steerpike]

I've never read Neuromancer, but I love the first line. It makes me want to read it...which I guess is the idea.

It’s good.

 

[FifthView]

Yeah, the line from Neuromancer is great. I also like the line from 1984, a little more. Also, the Jekyll and Hyde and Pride and Prejudice first lines. And Anna Karenina. Probably those last three in that order.

 

[CupofJoe]

My trio...
In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. JRR Tolkien, The Hobbit
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there. LP Hartley The Go-Between
I've read the first two but I really love the last one.
But I think the beginning of 1984 is just about the best fourteen words ever...

 

[Heliotrope]

The thing was:
- Galapagos, Kurt Vonnegut.

Vonnegut has such a great narrative voice. I just love it. Just another night at the pub drinking beers with Kurt.

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

When Andy was only two weeks old she tumbled from the sky, unannounced, onto the bark mulch pile Mrs. Perkins was digging to protect her marigolds.

- Treasure of Sorrows, by.... Me. Lol. ( I like it Don't judge me).

 

[FifthView]

When Andy was only two weeks old she tumbled from the sky, annanouced, onto the bark mulch pile Mrs. Perkins was digging to protect her marigolds.

- Treasure of Sorrows, by.... Me. Lol. ( I like it Don't judge me).

I hope it's spelled correctly in the book! [I'll stop judging now. It's a great first line. Oops I judged again.]

 

[Heliotrope]

Whatever are you talking about ? It is spelled perfectly.......

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

It was a dark and stormy night. [A Wrinkle in Time.]

 

[Heliotrope]

^^^^ my favourite book.

I love that it was just included on the bookcase in Interstellar.

 

[Ankari]

This is technically cheating, but I love this opening to every Wheel of Time book:

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 in the Mountains of Mist (the origination can change from book to book). The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.

-Eye of the World by Robert Jordan

Every time I read it I get goosebumps.

 

[Chessie2]

Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.--Margaret Mitchell from my favorite book of all time: Gone With The Wind

"Three hundred and forty–eight years, six months, and nineteen days ago to–day, the Parisians awoke to the sound of all the bells in the triple circuit of the city, the university, and the town ringing a full peal."--Victor Hugo from my 2nd favorite book ever, The Hunchback of Notre Dame

"Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmond, and Lucy."--C.S. Lewis from my favorite fantasy book of all time, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.

 

[Rkcapps]

There are just so many! All of the above are brilliant, but I'd have to go with "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times" even though I'm a Pride and Prejudice nut!!! Like the Wheel of Time, these first lines in Dickens and Austen really give a feel for the story to come.

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

"There are dragons in the twins' vegetable garden." [A Wind in the Door]

 

[skip.knox]

I've never read Neuromancer, but I love the first line. It makes me want to read it...which I guess is the idea.

I jumped back to this thread, struck by that line, but in quite a different way. I found the line a little sad, even heartbreaking. Because, next generation, the reader is 1) not going to know what a dead channel is, and 2) would picture flat black, if they picture anything.

The line is doomed because it is tied to a tiny sliver of human experience.

Tolstoy's line, otoh, is eternal.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

I jumped back to this thread, struck by that line, but in quite a different way. I found the line a little sad, even heartbreaking. Because, next generation, the reader is 1) not going to know what a dead channel is, and 2) would picture flat black, if they picture anything.

The line is doomed because it is tied to a tiny sliver of human experience.

Tolstoy's line, otoh, is eternal.

omg. I didn't even realize that.

I'm a member of probably the last generation that will even know what the line is talking about.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

The thing was:
- Galapagos, Kurt Vonnegut.

Vonnegut has such a great narrative voice. I just love it. Just another night at the pub drinking beers with Kurt.

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

When Andy was only two weeks old she tumbled from the sky, unannounced, onto the bark mulch pile Mrs. Perkins was digging to protect her marigolds.

- Treasure of Sorrows, by.... Me. Lol. ( I like it Don't judge me).

Oh, I love the Voyage of the Dawn Treader line.

 

[Rkcapps]

To stick with fantasy, there's Janice Harry's The shifter:

“Stealing eggs is a lot harder than stealing the whole chicken.”

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

To stick with fantasy, there's Janice Harry's The shifter:

“Stealing eggs is a lot harder than stealing the whole chicken.”

I actually know this book! I tried to read it like 3 times, but each time I couldn't get into it...

 

[Rkcapps]

I hear you DofA! The line above is a great starting line but I've put the book aside at Chapter 2 for now. Like you I couldn't get into it. I do hope to try it again one day but I've just discovered Terry Pratchett so I'll be immersed in discworld for a while! I must say, isn't it funny, the first line of The Colour of Magic didn't grab me but the story did, whereas the first line of The Shifter is clever but the story doesn't grab me. Wonder why?

Janice gives such worthy advice on her website, I owe it to her to try and read The Shifter. I did really like the concept behind her magic...