Beauty has got to be astonishing, astounding—it's got to burst in on you like a dream, like the exquisite eyes of a girl.
 F. Scott Fitzgerald, Flappers and Philosophers (1920). copy citation

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Author F. Scott Fitzgerald
Source Flappers and Philosophers
Topic beauty dream
Date 1920
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4368/4368-h/4368-h.htm

Context

“The negroes' song had died away to a plaintive humming and it seemed as if minute by minute the brightness and the great silence were increasing until he could almost hear the midnight toilet of the mermaids as they combed their silver dripping curls under the moon and gossiped to each other of the fine wrecks they lived on the green opalescent avenues below. "You see," said Carlyle softly, "this is the beauty I want. Beauty has got to be astonishing, astounding—it's got to burst in on you like a dream, like the exquisite eyes of a girl." He turned to her, but she was silent. "You see, don't you, Anita—I mean, Ardita?" Again she made no answer. She had been sound asleep for some time. IV In the dense sun-flooded noon of next day a spot in the sea before them resolved casually into a green-and-gray islet, apparently composed of a great granite cliff at its northern end which slanted south through a mile of vivid coppice and grass to a sandy beach melting lazily into the surf.” source