Polly loves Books

A story has no beginning or end; arbitrarily one chooses that moment of experience from which to look back or from which to look ahead.

— First line in “The End of the Affair“ by Graham Greene

The sweat wis lashing oafay Sick Boy; he wis trembling.

— first line in Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh

I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.

— first line in I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically.

— first line in Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence

Vaughan died yesterday in his last car-crash.

— First line in Crash by J. G. Ballard

It was the day my grandmother exploded.

— First line in The Crow Road by Iain M. Banks

I am not Stiller!

— First line in Stiller by Max Frisch

It was a wrong number that started it, the telephone ringing three times in the dead of night, and the voice on the other end asking for someone he was not.

— First Line in City of Glass by Paul Auster

Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo…

— First line in A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man by James Joyce

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 belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only

— First line in A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens