Quotes for All
The spider dances her web without knowing there are flies that will get caught in it. The fly, dancing nonchalantly on a sunbeam gets caught without knowing what lies in store. But through both of them It dances. So, too, the archer hits the target without having aimed-more I cannot say. Eugen Herrigel
Don’t think of what you have to do, don’t consider how to carry it out! The shot will only go smoothly when it takes the archer himself by surprise. It must be as if the bowstring suddenly cut through the thumb that held it. You mustn’t open the right hand on purpose. Eugen Herrigel
I must only warn you of one thing. You have become a different person in the course of these years. For this is what the art of archery means: a profound and far-reaching contest of the archer with himself. Perhaps you have hardly noticed it yet, but you will feel it very strongly when you … Read more
The shot will go smoothly only when it takes the archer himself by surprise. Eugen Herrigel
You can learn from an ordinary bamboo leaf what ought to happen. It bends lower and lower under the weight of snow. Suddenly the snow slips to the ground without the leaf having stirred. Stay like that at the point of highest tension until the shot falls from you. So, indeed, it is: when the … Read more
In competitive archery, risk assessment has minimal bearing on quality of performance, since the archer has so little choice over shot selection. By contrast, in a hunt, shots vary in quality according to how well selected they may be. Ernest Sosa
A hunter archer can also be out to shock by taking crazy shots. What makes his shots crazy is set by excessive risk, judged by hunting-archery standards, which would tend to draw agreement from knowledgeable observers. Ernest Sosa
You never can tell when you send a word, Like an arrow shot from a bow By an archer blind, be it cruel or kind, Just where it may chance to go! Ella Wheeler Wilcox
They tell us sometimes that if we had only kept quiet, all these desirable things would have come about of themselves. I am reminded of the Greek clown who, having seen an archer bring down a flying bird, remarked, sagely: ‘You might have saved your arrow, for the bird would anyway have been killed by … Read more
There is a road that turning always Cuts off the country of Again. Archers stand there on every side And as it runstime’s deer is slain, And lies where it has lain. Edwin Muir