Quote of the week

I seem to remember that they always showed a certain movie on Easter when I was a child. I also remember reading the book. I was lying on my parents' bed on the belly, my feet up in the air, and I can still feel the thick, cool and satiny quilt bedspread when I think of it.

Many people agree that one actor is stealing the show here, the great Peter Ustinov as the crazy Emperor Nero.

Nero (looking at burning Rome): Petronius, look what I've created! Tigellinus, my robe of grief. Terpnos! Lyre. History will judge my song, Petronius. Will it be great enough to match the occasion? I'm seized with the fear that it will not be great enough.
Petronius: It will be worthy of the spectacle, as the spectacle is worthy of you.
Nero: You ... you encourage me, Petronius. But I'm aware that I must compete with those who sang of the burning of Troy. My song must be greater, just as Rome is greater than Troy!
(singing) Silence, ye spheres, be still, ye hurtling stars, open wide-vaulted skies above me. Now at last, lo, I see Olympus, and a light from the summit doth illumine me. I am one with the gods, immortal, I am Nero, the artist who creates with fire, that the dreams of my life may come true. To the flames now I give the past, to the flames and soil. Take thou this Rome, oh, receive her now, ye flames, consume her as would a furnace, burn on, o ancient Rome. Burn on, burn on!!!

Quo Vadis, USA, 1951