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/lit/ - Literature

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16615650 No.16615650 [Reply] [Original]

What are some of the best first lines in literature? What makes a good opening line?

>> No.16615655

you stupid monkey

>> No.16615666

>>16615650
>Sage and serenity infused infused my sleeping senses beneath the southern skies of Jupiter.

>> No.16615680

>A musty fart presents itself to my olfactory nerves

>> No.16615685

>The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

>> No.16615690

>Aujourd'hui, maman est morte. ... Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas.

>> No.16615694

>>16615650
>In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

>> No.16615700

>>16615650
holy this intro is crappy HAHAHAHHHAA

it is so bad it could have been written by a woman

>> No.16615703

>A screaming comes across the sky.

>> No.16615706

>>16615694
In principo Deus escribit latinam

>> No.16615711

>>16615706
INPRINCIPIODEVSCREAVITCAELVMETTERRVM

>> No.16615719

>Today it seems to me providential that Fate should have chosen Braunau on the Inn as my birthplace.

>> No.16615745

All this happened, more or less

>> No.16615967

En un lugar de la Mancha, de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme, no ha mucho tiempo que vivía un hidalgo de los de lanza en astillero, adarga antigua, rocín flaco y galgo corredor

>> No.16615995

>>16615650
I fucking hate that opener.
Ooh, it's so great. Fuck off. I really fucking hate it. It's so obnoxious.

This is the best first line:
>The gale tore at him and he felt its bite deep within and he knew if they did not make landfall within three days they would all be dead.

>> No.16615997

Stately plum Buck Mulligan...

>> No.16616003

>>16615997
STATELY PLUMP BUCK MULLIGAN

>> No.16616011

2 de noviembre

He sido cordialmente invitado a formar parte del realismo visceral. Por supuesto, he aceptado. No hubo ceremonia de iniciación. Mejor así.

>> No.16616018

In the Name of Allah—the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful.

>> No.16616093

>>16615650
EN UN LUGAR DE LA MANCHA DE CUYO NOMBRE NO QUIERO ACORDARME

>> No.16616110

>>16616018
i love how midwits, from judaism, Christianity, hinduism, mahayana, humanism fall for the compassion meme

>> No.16616116

>>16616110
How is it a meme? You don't know what you're talking about.

>> No.16616261

>>16615650
Call me Ishmael.

>> No.16616263

>>16615650
>Über dem Atlantik befand isch ein barometrisches Minium; es wanderte ostwärts, einem über Russland lagernden Maximum zu, und verriet noch nicht die Neigung, diesem nördlich auszuweichen.

>> No.16616393
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16616393

>>16615650
Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc'd by fate,
And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate,
Expell'd and exil'd, left the Trojan shore.

>> No.16616403

>>16616393
weak bait

>> No.16616452

>>16615650
This has to be the most overrated opening line ever

>Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins

>Call me Ishmael

>Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way

>> No.16616459
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16616459

>>16615700
Lord knows what kind of incontinent demon pissed out the likes of a bore such as you, certainly not from a mother's womb, more likely testies from a wanking journalist, from the lower rungs of Hell.

>> No.16616474

>>16615650
>It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents—except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.

>> No.16617239

>>16615650

>Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.

>> No.16617464

>>16615650
>LONGTEMPS

>> No.16617598

>>16615650
I came across a car by the woods, its door open, and no one to be seen

>> No.16617664

>An den Ufern der Havel lebte, um die Mitte des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts, ein Roßhändler, namens Michael Kohlhaas, Sohn eines Schulmeisters, einer der rechtschaffensten zugleich und entsetzlichsten Menschen seiner Zeit.

>> No.16617673

>>16616263
I wonder if he tried to emulate the first lines of Goethe's autobiography:
>Am 28. August 1749, mittags mit dem Glockenschlage zwölf, kam ich in Frankfurt am Main auf die Welt. Die Konstellation war glücklich; die Sonne stand im Zeichen der Jungfrau, und kulminierte für den Tag; Jupiter und Venus blickten sie freundlich an, Merkur nicht widerwärtig; Saturn und Mars verhielten sich gleichgültig: nur der Mond, der soeben voll ward, übte die Kraft seines Gegenscheins um so mehr, als zugleich seine Planetenstunde eingetreten war. Er widersetzte sich daher meiner Geburt, die nicht eher erfolgen konnte, als bis diese Stunde vorübergegangen.

>> No.16617757

>>16616393
BASED
>>16616403
cringe

>> No.16617758

>>16617598

Which book is that?

>> No.16617764

>>16617758
I just made it up.

>> No.16617768

>>16616093
ULTRA BASADO
>>16616261
Based
>>16616452
Based

>It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen
>It was a pleasure to burn

>inb4 MUH genre bad
I know, I know, but those opening lines are good ones

>> No.16618352
File: 164 KB, 409x325, ADBDC404-FFD8-478A-A5DD-F97D6C3393D4.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
16618352

>Supposing that Truth is a woman— what then?

>> No.16618877

>>16615650
>This all happened, more or less

>> No.16618887

>>16615745
Goddammit you beat me to it

>> No.16618900

>>16615995
I don't give a fuck about Dickens but Holy shit could you have found a more boring opening sentence if you tried?

>> No.16619136

What about best first words?

RAGE

>> No.16619332

>>16615650
I am a sick man. I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man.

>> No.16619344

>>16617673
Not impossible, but this is obviously more astronomical in nature while Musil's opening lines consist of tons metereological terms. Their prose is similar, though.

>> No.16619463

>Dieses Buch unternimmt es, das Verhältnis der Geschlechter in ein neues, entscheidendes Licht zu rücken.

>> No.16619506

>I said certified freak, seven days a week

>> No.16619516

>A Saturday afternoon in November was approaching the time of twilight, and the vast tract of unenclosed wild known as Egdon Heath embrowned itself moment by moment.

>> No.16619736

>>16617764
Now write the rest of the book, anon.
I wanna read it (make it short).

>> No.16619865

Longtemps, je me suis couché de bonne heure.

>> No.16619909

>>16615650
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.

>> No.16620464

>I, Donald John Trump

>> No.16620476

IDLE READER, you can believe me when I say that I’d like this book, as a child of my intellect, to be the most beautiful, the most gallant and most ingenious one that could ever be imagined.

>> No.16620482

>>16616452
Came specifically to find the opening to AK.

>> No.16620490

>>16615706
Damn, Latin is cool.

>> No.16620520

>>16620490
Lingua Dei est.

>> No.16620772

>>16615650
Unpretentious is better but less memorable.

>The clocks were striking thirteen.
Reading this physically annoyed me.

>In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
Okay, now we're talkin'.

>> No.16620783

...Horror and Madness.

>> No.16620798

>>16617239
Was looking for this. I still have tepid faith in this board.

>> No.16621735

>>16615655
Underrated

(I was saying Boo urns)

>> No.16621755

>>16615650
The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.

>> No.16621787
File: 51 KB, 400x400, 611FNbYKG6L._SY400_.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
16621787

>>16615650
In principio erat Verbum, et Verbum erat apud Deum, et Deus erat Verbum

>> No.16622331

>>16615650
“Just the place for a Snark!” the Bellman cried,
As he landed his crew with care;
Supporting each man on the top of the tide
By a finger entwined in his hair.

>> No.16622361

She came along the alley and up
the back stairs the way she always
used to. Doc hadn’t seen her for
over a year. Nobody had. Back
then it was always sandals, bottom
half of a flower print bikini,
faded Country Joe & the Fish Tshirt.

>> No.16622552
File: 83 KB, 590x826, CD63D726-4E9E-435B-8B14-FD837354B8B8.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
16622552

>>16615719

>> No.16622986

>>16615650
riverrun

>> No.16623097

μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος

>> No.16623116

>>16619909
>In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.

Is all this christposting for real or trolling? I can't tell.

>> No.16623271

>Sing, O muse, of the rage of Achilles

>> No.16623284

>>16616116
I’m at work but in 7 or 8 hours I’m going to come back and school your dumbass.

>> No.16623290

>Tell me about a complicated man.

>> No.16623309

>>16616393
Arma virumque cano, troiae qui primus ab oris

>> No.16623316

天下大勢,分久必合,合久必分

>> No.16623326

The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.

>> No.16623413

What the fuck did you
just fucking say about me
you little bitch? I'll

>> No.16623423

>>16615655
"You stupid monkey", cried Captain Callaghan, as the African brought the sword down into his skull.

>> No.16623432

Sing, O Muse...

>> No.16623871

>>16615997
based James Fruit poster