Gabriel García Márquez · 120 pages
Rating: (89.7K votes)
“He always considered death an unavoidable professional hazard.”
“When I wake up," he said, "remind me that I'm going to marry her.”
“They looked like two children," she told me. And that thought frightened her, because she'd always felt that only children are capable of everything.”
“He was healthier than the rest of us, but when you listened with the stethoscope you could hear the tears bubbling inside his heart.”
“There had never been a death so foretold.”
“A falcon who chases a warlike crane can only hope for a life of pain.”
“Tenía una manera de hablar que más bien le servía para ocultar que para decir.”
“Halfway through one August day, while she was embroidering with her friends, she heard someone coming to the door. She didn't have to look to see who it was. "He was fat and was beginning to lose his hair, and he already needed glasses to see things close by," she told me. "But it was him, God damn it, it was him!”
“She was certain that the Vicario brothers were not as eager to carry out the sentence as to find someone who would do them the favor of stopping them.”
“They’re perfect,” she was frequently heard to say. “Any man will be happy with them because they’ve been raised to suffer.”
“He was carrying a suitcase with clothing in order to stay and another just like it with almost two thousand letters that she had written him. They were arranged by date in bundles ties with colored ribbons, and they were all unopened.”
“The truth is that she spoke about her misfortune without any shame in order to cover up the other misfortune, the real one, that was burning in her insides.”
“ولم يكن ليستوعب، بصورة خاصة، كيف يمكن للحياة أن تستفيد من مصادفات كثيرة محظورة على الأدب، لتتم دون أي عرقلة عملية موت معلنة إلى ذلك الحد.”
“Anda, niña- le dijo temblando de rabia-: dinos quién fue.
Ella se demoró apenas el tiempo necesario para decir el nombre. Lo buscó en las tinieblas, lo encontró a primera vista entre los tantos y tantos nombres confundibles de este mundo y del otro, y lo dejó clavado en la pared con su dardo certero, como a una mariposa sin albedrío cuya sentencia estaba escrita para siempre.
-Santiago Nasar- le dijo.”
“Había nacido como las grandes reinas de la historia con el cordón umbilical enrollado en el cuello.”
“Son perfectas -le oía decir con frecuencia-. Cualquier hombre será feliz con ellas, porque han sido criadas para sufir.”
“On the morning that they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at five-thirty in the morning to wait for the boat bishop was coming on.”
“Es que murió sin entender su muerte.”
“اللعنة! لا يمكنك أن تتصور كم هو شاق قتل إنسان!" هكذا قال بابلو فيكاريو”
“The only thing that didn't occur to her was to give up. Nevertheless, he seemed insensible to her
delirium; it was like writing to nobody.”
“Then they both kept on knifing him against the door with alternate and easy stabs, floating in the dazzling backwater they had found on the other side of fear.”
“Bana bir ön yargı verin, dünyayı yerinden oynatayım.”
“«Parecían dos niños», me dijo. Y esa reflexión la asustó, pues siempre había pensado que sólo los niños son capaces de todo.”
“...I caught the smell of a warm woman and I saw the eyes of an insomniac leopard in the darkness...”
“الشرف هو الحب" , هكذا كنت أسمع أمي تقول”
“Cuando despierte - dijo- , recuérdame que me voy a casar con ella !”
“Seek out positive people who have achieved the success you want to create in your own life. Remember the adage: “Never ask advice of someone with whom you wouldn’t want to trade places.”
“This thought didn't make me cringe like most teenagers would have.”
“The positive testimony of history is that the State invariably had its origin in conquest and confiscation. No primitive State known to history originated in any other manner.”
“Would you like to dance?"
I knew I had frosting on my nose.
Alex leaned over and wuped it off with his thumb. "Well?"
I could only nod. I had a full mouth, too. I stood up, swallowed, and accepted the napkin he was holding. "You're here."
"I'm here," he agreed, like it hadn't been a ridiculous thing to say. "I am crashing your sister's wedding. Hope she won't mind."
"She won't mind."
He was wearing a tux. A real tux, complete with bow tie and silk lapels. I stroked one. "I'm guessing this isn't a rental."
He squirmed a little. "No, it's mine. Nice dress."
I looked down at the snug purple monstrosity my sister had chosen. At least it had a mandarin collar and some sleeves. "It's a cheongsam," she'd announced proudly. "It's Eggplant Ho Lee Mess" was Frankie's take. My pear-shaped cousin Vanessa got strapless. Now she looked like an eggplant.
"You look beautiful," Alex said, but the corner of his mouth was twitching.
"Well,you look like...like..." I sighed. "Okay, you look really really good." Then, again, "You're here."
"I'm here."
"Why?"
"I missed you," he said simply.
"It's only been four days."
"A very,very long four days. But your e-mail helped." He reached for my hand. "Now,are we dancing or not?"
We did, and it wasn't as complicated as I'd thought it might be. I stood on my toes, he bent down a little, and we fit together pretty well. The song ended way too soon.
"So," Alex said.
"So."
"We can stay here if you want to...or if you have to. But I have another suggestion. Let's go watch the sun rise."
It sounded like a good idea to me. Except... "It's ten o'clock. And it's freezing out there."
"Trust me," he said.
"okay.”
“You could’ve warned me.” Jason’s frown was likewise focused on the old man once again. “You both need to pay better attention,” Sensei said. “I didn’t think I needed to explain that glowing metal is hot.”
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