Quotes from Cry to Heaven

Anne Rice ·  566 pages

Rating: (18.2K votes)


“And this time as the lashes come, try to think about the pain, instead of against it, because there is not one single aspect of life, past, present, or future, that does not tear your reason from you, to think on it. So think about the pain. This pain after all has its limits. You can chart its passage through your body. It has a beginning, middle, end. Imagine if it had a color. The first cut of the lash is what, red? Red, spreading into a brilliant yellow. And this one again, red, red, no yellow, and then white, white, white, white. . .Why have you incarcerated yourself in this palazzo of torture chambers, why do you not leave this place? Because you are a monster and this is a school for monsters, and if you leave here, then you will be completely, completely alone! Alone with this!

Don't weep in front of these strangers. Swallow it down. Don't weep in front of these strangers! Cry to heaven, cry to heaven, cry to heaven.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“In all my life,” Ernestino said, “I have never heard a voice like that. God has touched you, Signore. But sing while you can, because it won’t be long before those high notes leave you forever.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“That one, there,” Tonio murmured, but the weight of his suspicion was breaking him, sickening him. Send death for me, like that, some paid assassin? It seemed he’d already been dealt the blow and this was not life any longer, rather some nightmare place where that sentinel stood on the bridge and these strangers urged him to a meaningless portal.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“He was tired and full of shame, and if Ernestino and the others wouldn’t brave this rain, he would go it alone, he would find some place to sing, some place where, anonymous and numbed by drink, he could sing until he had forgotten everything.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“But he could not go up to the room as yet, and seating himself on a stone step, his head on his arms, he wept silently. Years had passed since he had shed tears, or so it seemed. Surely years since he had let them flow so copiously. And what stopped him finally was that he could hear his own crying.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven



“The Horror of the world was that thousands of evils fell upon innocent people, and no one was punished and with great promise there was nothing but pain and desire Children mutilated to form a choir of seraphim. Their song was a cry to heaven the sky was not listening. ”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“Tonio Treschi was that half man, that less than man that arouses the contempt of every whole man who looks upon it. Tonio Treschi was that thing which women cannot leave alone and men find infinitely disturbing, frightening, pathetic, the butt of jokes and endless bullying, the necessary evil of the church choirs and the opera stage which is, outside that artifice and grace and soaring music, very simply monstrous.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“So why must it wound him that the most despairing music is full of beauty? Why must it hurt him and make him cynical and sad and untrusting?”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“Who were the men who did this?" Guido demanded suddenly.
Tonio was putting on his cloak. He looked up as if already in deep thought.
"Fools," he answered, "at the command of a coward.”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven


“Who were the men who did this?" Guido demanded suddenly.
Tonio was putting on his cloack. He looked up as if already in deep thought.
"Fools," he answered, "at the command of a coward."

page 139”
― Anne Rice, quote from Cry to Heaven



About the author

Anne Rice
Born place: in New Orleans, Louisiana, The United States
Born date October 4, 1941
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Popular quotes

“But first,” Morpheus said with a dismissive sweep of his hand, “we have to be sure what we’re up against when we raid the castle. You and Alyssa managed to take out quite a chunk of the opposition with your fancy footwork. We’re here to assess if the numbers match up with the ones Rabid reported. We must ensure that Grenadine doesn’t have any cards hidden up her sleeve.” He slapped Jeb on the back. “See what I did there? ‘Cards up her sleeve’?” He chuckled.”
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“Evening Solace

The human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;­
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed.
And days may pass in gay confusion,
And nights in rosy riot fly,
While, lost in Fame's or Wealth's illusion,
The memory of the Past may die.

But, there are hours of lonely musing,
Such as in evening silence come,
When, soft as birds their pinions closing,
The heart's best feelings gather home.
Then in our souls there seems to languish
A tender grief that is not woe;
And thoughts that once wrung groans of anguish,
Now cause but some mild tears to flow.

And feelings, once as strong as passions,
Float softly back-­a faded dream;
Our own sharp griefs and wild sensations,
The tale of others' sufferings seem.
Oh ! when the heart is freshly bleeding,
How longs it for that time to be,
When, through the mist of years receding,
Its woes but live in reverie !

And it can dwell on moonlight glimmer,
On evening shade and loneliness;
And, while the sky grows dim and dimmer,
Feel no untold and strange distress­
Only a deeper impulse given
By lonely hour and darkened room,
To solemn thoughts that soar to heaven,
Seeking a life and world to come.”
― Emily Brontë, quote from The Complete Poems of Emily Bronte [with Biographical Introduction]


“Justice at all costs' is not justice.”
― Thomas Sowell, quote from The Quest for Cosmic Justice


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