“Damaged people are dangerous. They know they can survive.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“All damaged people are dangerous. Survival makes them so.' 'Why?' 'Because they have no pity. They know what others can survive, as they did.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“They say that childhood forms us, that those early influences are the key to everything. Is the peace of the soul so easily won? Simply the inevitable result of a happy childhood. What makes childhood happy? Parental harmony? Good health? Security? Might not a happy childhood be the worst possible preparation for life? Like leading a lamb to the slaughter.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“..I always recognize the foces that will shape my life. I let them do their work. Sometimes they tear through my life like a hurricane. Sometimes they simply shift the ground under me, so that I stand on different earth, and something or someone has been swallowed up. I steady myself, in the earthquate. I lie down, and let the hurricane pass over me. I never fight. Afterwards I look around me, and I say, 'Ah, so this at least is left for me. And that dear person has also survived.' I quietly inscribe on the stone tablet of my heart the name which has gone forever. Th inscription is a thing of agony. Then I start on my way again.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“There was a full moon in the starless sky. I thought how rarely I had noticed such things. Some deep failure of the soul perhaps. An inherited emptiness. A nothingness passed from generation to generation. A flaw in the psyche, discovered only by those who suffer by it.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“That is my story, simply told. Please do not ask again. I have told you in order to issue a warning. I have been damaged. Damaged people are dangerous. They know they can survive.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“Lucky people should hide. Pray the days of wrath do not visit their home.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“Our sanity depends essentially on a narrowness of vision--the ability to select the elements vital to survival, while ignoring the great truths.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“Was my sin basically one of untruthfulness? Or, more likely, one of cowardice? But the liar knows the truth. The coward knows his fear and runs away.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“She was the split-second experience that changes everything.; the car smash; the letter we shouldn't have opened; the lump in the breast or groin; the blinding flash. On my well-ordered stage-set the lights were up, and maybe at last I was waiting in the wings.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“What really makes us is beyond grasping. It's way beyond knowing. We give in to love... because it gives us some sense of what is unknowable. Nothing else matters, not at the end.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“When we mourn those who die young – those who have been robbed of time – we weep for lost joys. We weep for opportunities and pleasure we ourselves have never known. We feel sure that somehow that young body would have known the yearning delight for which we searched in vain all our lives. We believe that the untried soul, trapped in its young prison, might have flown free and known the joy that we still seek. We say that life is sweet, its satisfactions deep. All this we say, as we sleepwalk our time through years of days and nights. We let time cascade over us like a waterfall, believing it to be never-ending. Yet each day that touches us, and every man in the world, is unique; irredeemable; over. And just another Monday.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“The passion that transforms life, and art, did not seem to be mine. But in all essentials, my life was a good performance.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“Children are the great gamble. From the moment they are born, our helplessness increases. Instead of being ours to mould and shape after our best knowledge and endeavour, they are themselves. From their birth they are the centre of our lives, and the dangerous edge of existence.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“Men and women find all sorts of ways to be together, all sorts of ways. Yours was high and dangerous. Most of us stay on the lower paths.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
“The day then trapped me in its iron bars of phone calls and meetings, letters to read, letters to write, decisions to make, promises to break.”
― Josephine Hart, quote from Damage
Josephine Hart
Born place: in Mullingar, County Westmeath, Ireland
Born date March 1, 1942
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“The moment in The Bell Jar when Esther Greenwood realizes after thirty days in the same black turtleneck that she never wants to wash her hair again, that the repeated necessity of the act is too much trouble, that she wants to do it once and be done with it, seems like the book's true epiphany. You know you've completely descended into madness when the matter of shampoo has ascended into philosophical heights.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, quote from Prozac Nation
“Children are dying.'
Lull nodded. 'That's a succinct summary of humankind, I'd say. Who needs tomes and volumes of history? Children are dying. The injustices of the world hide in those three words. Quote me, Duiker, and your work's done.'
The bastard's right. Economics, ethics, the games of the gods - all within that single, tragic statement. I'll quote you, soldier. Be assured of that.”
― Steven Erikson, quote from Deadhouse Gates
“Who you choose to walk with through life will be the most important decision that you will ever, ever make. You will have your children and you will love them because they are yours and because they will be wonderful. Just like you ... But who you marry is a choice. The man you choose should make you happy, encourage you in following your dreams, big ones and little ones.”
― Heather Gudenkauf, quote from The Weight of Silence
“Now our poor Gib never had a sense of humor to lose...”
― Sharon Kay Penman, quote from When Christ and His Saints Slept
“Love is a debt, she thought. When the bill comes, you pay in grief.”
― Mary Doria Russell, quote from Children of God
No Exit
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The Camel Club
The High KingBookQuoters 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.
