Quotes from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Hurt me. Until I am outside pain.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“I am tired. Too full of stuff I've done. Where my legs hurt where my scalp hurts. I'll not fight the thing inside me anymore. Let it eat me up. Please God. I want it to.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Do you hear me? Is it ever time for you to understand. I meant I meant that for I never thought you could think you were low. Were lost at the moment when they cut you off. Cut your head out heart brain. It is not I know was not that but to me it was to me. Like I could have seen you in the bright of day. Like the light could have come up from the sea and take you over. Me over. Is there. Forgive that. Forgive that me that I was fallen down. That I was under the weather under the same sky and did not. Not yet. If I took. If I had taken your good right hand I might have pulled you. Up. Pulled the black sea out of us. Saw you. Left you. Is there some truth in that? I went out to the cold. Thought I'd know what to do. Bring you with me. Bring you with. Sad and sad and sad fool me slipping down. Slope hill mountainside. Muck and stones on me. On my feet and rain in my hair. I thought about it but I could not stop. Pushed it further in. Needle and syringe. This will take me out of that. Like it could. As though it might do in any way. Forgive me. Forgive me that that I didn't see. Look out my eyes. That I didn't know what I was doing though I did though I did. Oh do you love me. Can you love me. Do you love me still. My sins. My grievous. Woe my wrong. I went out to him and said do what you will if you want. If you're able will you save me from that. I put a pillow on my face on your face and I said suffocate. It could have been. It could have been that. If I chose if I didn't. If I knew what to do. I don't so by the way I'm telling you. I'm warning now what a monster I have become. Soap in my mouth my eyes my hair turning bitter at the smallest drop. Of the rain give me the rain and all that. Wash oh yes wash that's it wash away. My. Sin.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Board my body up. I’m not for loving. Anymore.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“You’ll give her name. In the stitches of her skin she’ll wear your say.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“For all of that I wanted to be out of it. All of that. You wanted to be in.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“See. My one act. I might be a person. Beneath the.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“We were moving off now. From each other. As cannot be. Helped. I didn't want it from that time on. You know. All that. When you said sit with me on the school bus. I said no. That inside world had caught alight and what I wanted. To be left alone. To look at it. To swing the torch into every corner of what he'd we'd done. Know it and wonder what does it mean. I learned to turn it off, the world that was not my own. Stop up my ears and everything. Who are you? You and me were never this. This boy and girl that do not speak. But somehow I've left you behind and you're just looking on.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“And they clapped they loved they worshipped him. I picked up sticks out of my hair. Dirt up off my tongue. I felt the loving smears go in. The loving blood. I felt water rushing in my brain. I dead the heart. I am for you alone.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Do you love me? Can you love me even after that? Even now. I won't ask and I won't say that inside myself or ever out again. Forgive me brother. I know not what I do. Forgive me brother for I have sinned. We are all the things we'll ever be.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Besides it’s as nothing to the death of a child. He doesn’t mind telling you his faith was sorely tried. There’s no grief like a parent’s.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Right now. Next now. What I’ll be?”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Have a smack. Was all that happened for years. And my head is good for secrets. I can bang it on the wall. It takes the nervous out and no one bothers for it at all.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“There is no Jesus here these days just Come all you fucking lads. I’ll have you every one any day. Breakfast dinner lunch and tea. The human frame. The human frame. The human frame requires. Give them something. A good hock of spit for what it’s worth. They’ll say my name forever shame but do exactly what I say.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Who are you? You and me were never this. This boy and girl that do not speak. But somehow I've left you behind and you're just looking on.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“I have cans. In my bag. Where do I? Out them there no don't put down or they'll go you'll be sorry. Money spent. I trup trup off behind her. Think I'm new and white. In the garden. In the wet. For grass still sucks it up all day. Where's this? Just some fella I know she says. He said come and bring a friend. Him and other lads have this band. Oh. Brilliant. Good too. They squat here. Christ. What do I know? What do I know? People living mad life but I'm around it now. I can't be in. I'm. What'd I'd say to those girls in school if. No. I won't. Won't be going back in there.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“This wrong doubtful body should not have been mine. Mine was. Not this. Was perfect. Once. Drag the. I will and sit and drown if the. Come water. Over land. Swallow up. Swallow me down. Drag me in the gullys. In the pipes please and the drains.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Not as good as me in the back of my head. In my silent they’re not so clever not so quick and rule the world anyway as if it’s fair. Think I’m too good. I am but would not say it to their face. Lucky for them.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“Goes goes the holy joes. Going to spread the good clean word. Going to say what a good death you have made. What a saintly. What a sad. Young one. Gathered to himself the very best. Left.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“What you doing? Stop leave me. Jesus. Bit me. Below the neckline of the dress. The. Bite. Hurt that. My breast. Through the stupid white my bothered skin. See blood come. Rings I think of teeth flower. You. Don’t. You don’t. Again. My lovely girl my love my. He says. Look at me. I’ll always have you in the end. Because I love you. Shut up. Best. So so so so? Well fuck you then. He says. Wipe up that. Put your bra. Fucking state you’re in. Don’t know a man loves you. Don’t know. Fucking mental that you. Dirty cunt like him. Well I liked it and I fucked it and I wanted it some more. You fucking. Shut your. Caught my, the roots, in my scalp like they’ll rip me. Coming. Uncle loving coming. Coming. We to. Home.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“For I am a woman now.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

“It’s love. It. Is. Love. Or love waiting for a man to come and take her place. But how would someone fit, I don’t know, in between us two.”
― Eimear McBride, quote from A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing

About the author

Popular quotes

“I threatened him with bodily harm. He promised to bring me cake for the rest of my life.”
― Chris Cannon, quote from Going Down in Flames

“Set boundaries even when you’re scared, and when it doesn’t feel comfortable to do. Eventually setting boundaries will happen naturally for you,”
― Melody Beattie, quote from The New Codependency: Help and Guidance for Today's Generation

“Maybe you can’t blame people for the pain that makes them who they are. Maybe that was just one more bullet you had to step in front of for someone you were supposed to love—even if you didn’t want to. Even if it hurt. Maybe that was love.”
― Anthony Breznican, quote from Brutal Youth

“If there is life after death, indeed life before life, then it would make more sense to me for it is as though I have known you always, through time and space and despite all logic, I know you as I know myself, as no one else does.”
― Tami Egonu, quote from Bird

“So before I was nine I had learned the basic canon of Arab life. It was me against my brother; me and my brother against our father; my family against my cousins and the clan; the clan against the tribe; and the tribe against the world. And all of us against the infidel.”
― Leon Uris, quote from The Haj

Interesting books

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.