Quotes from Averno

Louise Glück ·  79 pages

Rating: (1.9K votes)


“I think I can remember
being dead. Many times, in winter,
I approached Zeus. Tell me, I would ask him,
how can I endure the earth?”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“Doesn’t everyone want to feel in the night
the beloved body, compass, polestar,
to hear the quiet breathing that says
I am alive, that means also
you are alive, because you hear me,
you are here with me”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“I am tired of having hands
she said
I want wings —

But what will you do without your hands
to be human?

I am tired of human
she said
I want to live on the sun —”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“It is true that there is not enough beauty in the world.
It is also true that I am not competent to restore it.
Neither is there candor, and here I may be of some use.”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“The assignment was to fall in love.
The details were up to you.
The second part was
to include in the poem certain words,
words drawn from a specific text
on another subject altogether.”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno



“The sound of the sea— just memory now.”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“You get on a train, you disappear.

You write your name on the window, you disappear.

There are places like this everywhere,
places you enter as a young girl
from which you never return.”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


“I fell asleep in a river, I woke in a river,
of my mysterious
failure to die I can tell you
nothing, neither
who saved me nor for what cause—”
― Louise Glück, quote from Averno


About the author

Louise Glück
Born place: in New York City, The United States
Born date April 22, 1943
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“A man who tells secrets or stories must think of who is hearing or reading, for a story has as many versions as it has readers. Everyone takes what he wants or can from it and thus changes it to his measure. Some pick out parts and reject the rest, some strain the story through their mesh of prejudice, some paint it with their own delight. A story must have some points of contact with the reader to make him feel at home in it. Only then can he accept wonders.”
― John Steinbeck, quote from The Winter of Our Discontent


“Although a graduate of the University of California the bride is nonetheless an extremely attractive young woman.”
― Frank B. Gilbreth Jr., quote from Cheaper by the Dozen


“Did last night really happen?" One side of his lips tipped up, and my chest swelled. I'd missed that smile. "Depends on what you think happend." "I took my shirt off for you?" His eyes deepened. "Yes. Lovely moment.”
― J. Lynn, quote from Wait for You


“God wasn't love, couldn't be love. Because for me, love was a corpse.”
― Ellen Hopkins, quote from Burned


“En junio de 1922, con un marco se podían comprar dos cigarrillos; con doscientos setenta y dos marcos, un dólar americano. En marzo de 1923, el mismo día en que Paul metió al descuido una patata de más en la bolsa de la señora Schmidt, hacían falta cinco mil marcos para comprar un cigarrillo, y veinte mil para entrar en un banco y salir con un reluciente billete de un dólar.”
― Juan Gomez-Jurado, quote from The Traitor's Emblem


Interesting books

Johnny Tremain
(34.6K)
Johnny Tremain
by Esther Forbes
Chesapeake
(18.6K)
Chesapeake
by James A. Michener
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
(54.3K)
Memories of My Melan...
by Gabriel García Márquez
The Last Hero
(26.8K)
The Last Hero
by Terry Pratchett
Selling Scarlett
(6.9K)
Selling Scarlett
by Ella James
Dark Matter
(120.5K)
Dark Matter
by Blake Crouch

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.