Quotes from Close Range

“Anyway, there's something wrong with everybody and it's up to you to know what you can handle.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“You stand there, braced. Cloud shadows race over the buff rock stacks as a projected film, casting a queasy, mottled ground rash. The air hisses and it is no local breeze but the great harsh sweep of wind from the turning of the earth. The wild country--indigo jags of mountain, grassy plain everlasting, tumbled stones like fallen cities, the flaring roll of sky--provokes a spiritual shudder. It is like a deep note that cannot be heard but is felt, it is like a claw in the gut...
...Other cultures have camped here a while and disappeared. Only earth and sky matter. Only the endlessly repeated flood of morning light. You begin to see that God does not owe us much beyond that.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“A kind of joyous hysteria moved into the room, everything flying before the wind, vehicles outside getting dented to hell, the crowd sweaty and the smells of aftershave, manure, clothes dried on the line, your money’s worth of perfume, smoke, booze; the music subdued by the shout and babble through the bass hammer could be felt through the soles of the feet, shooting up the channels of legs to the body fork, center of everything. It is the kind of Saturday night that torches your life for a few hours, makes it seem like something is happening.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“There's a feeling you get driving down to Casper at night from the north, and not only there, other places where you come through hours of darkness unrelieved by any lights except the crawling wink of some faraway ranch truck. You come down a grade and all at once the shining town lies below you, slung out like all western towns, and with the curved bulk of mountain behind it. The lights trail away to the east in a brief and stubby cluster of yellow that butts hard up against the dark. And if you've ever been to the lonely coast you've seen how the shore rock drops off into the black water and how the light on the point is final. Beyond are the old rollers coming on for millions of years. It is like that here at night but instead of the rollers it's the wind. But the water was here once. You think about the sea that covered this place hundreds of millions of years ago, the slow evaporation, mud turned to stone. There's nothing calm in those thoughts. It isn't finished, it can still tear apart. Nothing is finished. You take your chances.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“Are you like an enchanted thing? A damn story where some girl lets a warty old toad sleep in her shoe and in the mornin the toad's a good-lookin dude makin omelettes?”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“Big and little they went on together to Molalla, to Tuska, to Roswell, Guthrie, Kaycee, to Baker and Bend. After a few weeks Pake said that if Diamond wanted a permanent traveling partner he was up for it. Diamond said yeah, although only a few states still allowed steer roping and Pake had to cover long, empty ground, his main territory in the livestock country of Oklahoma, Wyoming, Oregon and New Mexico. Their schedules did not fit into the same box without patient adjustment. But Pake knew a hundred dirt road shortcuts, steering them through scabland and slope country, in and out of the tiger shits, over the tawny plain still grooved with pilgrim wagon ruts, into early darkness and the first storm laying down black ice, hard orange-dawn, the world smoking, snaking dust devils on bare dirt, heat boiling out of the sun until the paint on the truck hood curled, ragged webs of dry rain that never hit the ground, through small-town traffic and stock on the road, band of horses in morning fog, two redheaded cowboys moving a house that filled the roadway and Pake busting around and into the ditch to get past, leaving junkyards and Mexican cafes behind, turning into midnight motel entrances with RING OFFICE BELL signs or steering onto the black prairie for a stunned hour of sleep.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“You are a knowledgeable girl,” he said, “and a damn good-lookin one, though upholstered. Care for a beer?”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“Here’s Doc Osborne, first Democratic governor. A lynch mob hung Big Nose George Parrott back in the 1870s. Doc got the body, skinned it, tanned the hide, made himself a medical bag and a pair a shoes. Wore the shoes to his inauguration. They don’t make Democrats like that anymore.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“The stale coffee is boiling up but he catches it before it goes over the side, pours it into a stained cup and blows on the black liquid, lets a panel of the dream slide forward. If he does not force his attention on it, it might stoke the day, rewarm that old, cold time on the mountain when they owned the world and nothing seemed wrong.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

“Later, that dozy embrace solidified in his memory as the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives.”
― Annie Proulx, quote from Close Range

About the author

Popular quotes

“Fascinated by the glitter of gain, man gazes at the Medusa-like face of greed and stands petrified.”
― Manly P. Hall, quote from Secret Teachings of All Ages: An Encyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Hermetic, Quabbalistic, and Ro

“Три жълти луни, по една за всеки, бяха накацали през прозореца и се забавляваха да правят гримаси на братята. Те, и тримата по нощници, се бяха пъхнали в леглото на Ситроен, откъдето най-добре се виждаха луните. Трите им опитомени мечета танцуваха в кръг около леглото и пееха тихичко, за да не събудят Клемантин – тази бавачка на омари. Ситроен лежеше между Ноел и Жоел и изглеждаше замислен. Той криеше нещо в ръцете си.
- Търся думи – каза той на братята си. – Тази започва с…
Той млъкна.
- Готово. Намерих я.
Той сложи ръце пред устата си и каза нещо много тихо. След това остави на юрганчето това, което държеше. Беше малък бял скакалец.
Мечетата веднага дойдоха и седнаха около него.
- Пазете се – каза Жоел, - нищо не виждам.
Мечетата се отстраниха и обърнаха гръб на леглото. Скакалецът ги поздрави и започна да прави акробатически номера. Децата искрено му се възхищаваха.
Но той много бързо се умори, изпрати им въздушна целувка, скочи много високо и изчезна.
Никой не се разтревожи. Ситроен вдигна пръста си.
- Знам друго нещо! – каза мъдро той. – Когато намерим бълхи, трябва да ги накараме да ни ухапят три пъти.
- Е, и? – попита Ноел.
- Тогава – отвърна Ситроен –
- Е можем да ставаме толкова малки, колкото си поискаме.
- И да минаваме под вратите?
- То се знае – отговори Ситроен. – Ще можем да ставаме малки като бълхи.
Мечетата се приближиха, това ги бе за интересувало.
- А може ли, като изговаряме думите обратно, да станем големи? – попитаха те в един глас.
- Не – рече Ситроен. – Така сте си много добре. Но ако искате, мога да направя така, че да ви пораснат маймунски опашки.
- Хич не искам – каза мечето на Жоел. – Благодаря!
Мечето на Ноел също отказа. А третото още мислеше.
- Ще си помисля – рече то.
Ноел започна да се прозява.
- Спи ми се. Отивам си в леглото – каза той.
- Аз също – каза Жоел.
След няколко минути те вече спяха. Само Ситроен беше буден, той гледаше ръцете си и намигваше. Когато намигаше по специален начин, му порастваха още два пръста. Утре щеше да научи братята си на това.”
― Boris Vian, quote from Heartsnatcher

“I did a research assignment on life in the Middle Ages only last year. I found the era fascinating, all that chivalry and court romance. But I never pictured anything as poor as this village. This is the pits. There's no romance here, definitely no chivary. And it stinks--of sweat and smoke and sewage.”
― Marianne Curley, quote from Old Magic

“It's a good thing to see that people can heal after they've been broken, that they can change and become something different from what they were before.”
― Wiley Cash, quote from A Land More Kind Than Home

“The loved object is simply one that has shared an experience at the same moment of time, narcissistically; and the desire to be near the beloved object is at first not due to the idea of possessing it, but simply to let the two experiences compare themselves, like reflections in different mirrors. All this may precede the first look, kiss, or touch; precede ambition, pride, or envy; precede the first declarations which mark the turning point—for from here love degenerates into habit, possession, and back to loneliness.”
― Lawrence Durrell, quote from Justine

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.