The three Bs of summer | LitBash 32

Summertime means rivers of cold beer. You're spending dearly to quench your thirst. But summer also means plenty of good reads. Yet, as John Lubbock observed: "How little our libraries cost us as compared with our liquor cellars." You can balance out your summer spending budget with the three Bs: a beach, a beer, and a book. Start with authors who were:

Born this week:

Elias Canetti, Austria
"The great writers of aphorisms read as if they had all known each other very well."

Ambroise-Marie Robert Carré, France

Andre Maurois, France
"Revolt against a tyrant is legitimate; it can succeed. Revolt against human nature is doomed to failure."

Aldous Huxley, UK
"Too much consistency is as bad for the mind as it is for the body. Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead."

Vladimir Korolenko, Russia

Guido Piovene, Italy

Alexandre Dumas, France
"Sleeping on a plank has one advantage - it encourages early rising."

Malcolm Lowry, UK
"What beauty can compare to that of a cantina in the early morning?"

Eyvind Johnson, Sweden
"One should think that you're someone living in the future and that you have to judge - approve or disapprove - the I that acts today, the I that keeps up or fails."

Ernst Glaeser, Germany

Emily Bronte, UK
"I'm now quite cured of seeking pleasure in society, be it country or town. A sensible man ought to find sufficient company in himself."

Aasmund Vinje, Norway

Primo Levi, Italy
"A country is considered the more civilised the more the wisdom and efficiency of its laws hinder a weak man from becoming too weak and a powerful one too powerful."

Walter Vogt, Switzerland

Died this week:

Mikhail Lermontov, Russia
"Many a calm river begins as a turbulent waterfall, yet none hurtles and foams all the way to the sea."

Gertrude Stein, USA
"Ladies there is no neutral position for us to assume."

Cyrano de Bergerac, France
"You are now bearing the punishment for the shortcomings of your world. Here, as in your world, there are benighted people who cannot tolerate thinking about things they are not accustomed to."

Erich Kastner, Germany

Helge Krog, Norway

Denis Diderot, France
"From fanaticism to barbarism is only one step."

Antoine de Saint-Exupery, France
"Here is my secret. It is very simple. It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye."