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Here are the openings of excellent novels. Many of them are already classics. Why might they have an impact on a reader. Do they grab your attention? Why?
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Call me Ishmael. -Herman Melville, Moby Dick (1851) |
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It was a bright cold day in April, the clocks were striking thirteen. -George Orwell, 1984 (1949) |
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I am an invisible man. -Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952) |
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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 incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was a season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.
-Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859) |
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The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new. -Samuel Beckett, Murphy (1938) |
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All this happened, more or less. -Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five (1969) |
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Dr. Weiss, at forty, knew that her life had been ruin by literature. -Anita Brookner, The Debut, (1981) |
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Ships in the distance have every man's wish on board. -Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, (1937) |
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It was the day my grandmother exploded. -Iain M. Banks, The Crow Road (1992) |
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Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu. -Ha Jin, Waiting (1999) |
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