That first line that launches you on a path from which there is simply no escape. That tempting start to a new book that has you pining for more. At Hermanus FynArts Christopher Hope shared a few classic first lines of books during a Travel Writing Workshop at The Windsor Hotel. The lines that pulls you in and spin a web around you and keeps you spellbound. Here are a few:
- The past is a foreign country; they do things different here. L. P. Hartley’s The Go-Between.
- All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina
- This is my favorite book in all the world, though I have never read it. William Goodwin’s The Princess Bride
- It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
- Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter
- It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
- All children, except one, grow up – Peter Pan by JM Barrie
- All of this happened, more or less – Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five
- It was a bright day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-four.
- And here is my best… Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu. Waiting by Ha Jin.
Frieda Lloyd Explores 