Quotes from Dancer

Colum McCann ·  336 pages

Rating: (3.5K votes)


“He's at ease, his body sculpted to the music, his shoulder searching the other shoulder, his right toe knowing the left knee, the height, the depth, the form, the control, the twist of his wrist, the bend of his elbow, the tilt of his neck, notes digging into arteries, and he is in the air now, forcing the legs up beyond muscular memory, one last press of the thighs, an elongation of form, a loosening of human contour, he goes higher and is skyheld.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“I suppose one finally learns, after much searching, that we really only belong to ourselves.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“I could tell from Anna's face that she had already told him about dancing in Saint Petersburg and that the memory weighed on her heavily. What monstrous things, our pasts, especially when they have been lovely. She had told a secret and now had the sadness of wondering how much deeper she might dig in order to keep the first secret fed.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“What monstrous things, our pasts, especially when they have been lovely.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“Watching them together slipped a knife between my ribs and hit my heart exactly.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer



“Once we had filled each other with desire, not remembrance.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“So you want to be a dancer? I asked. I want to dance better than I already do, he said.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“You are a dancer for only a part of your life. The rest of the time you are walking around, thinking about it!”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“We have always absorbed our own disintegration.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“Outside, the dark brushed the city and the wind unleashed the snow”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer



“My father had once told me the story of how, when he was in the work camp, a truckload of giant logs was brought in to be chopped. He was on ax duty with a gang of twelve. It was a dreadfully hot summer and each swing of the blade was torture. He hacked at a log and there was the unmistakable sound of metal hitting metal. He bent down and found a mushroom-shaped chunk of lead embedded in the trunk. A bullet. He counted the rings from the perimeter to the bullet and found they matched his age exactly.

We never escape ourselves, he said to me years later.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“If you are wise you step through the darkness only one foot at a time.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“How long ago it was and how strange, but all dead friends come to life again sometimes.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


“Truth: When criticized you go berserk, but in your defense remember that it is those who calmly listen who never change.”
― Colum McCann, quote from Dancer


About the author

Colum McCann
Born place: in Ireland
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Sometimes our highest goal becomes our big enemy when we move towards our goal blindly without focusing on the path we follow.”
― Durgesh Satpathy, quote from Equating the Equations of Insanity: A Journey from Grief to Victory


“The iconoclasm need not be loud and messy, I can almost hear him saying,”
― John Williams, quote from Butcher's Crossing


“It has always been my view that terrorism is not spawned by the poverty of money; it is spawned by the poverty of dignity. Humiliation is the most underestimated force in international relations and in human relations. It is when people or nations are humiliated that they really lash out and engage in extreme violence.”
― quote from The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century


“Bobby spotted the black cat lying on a windowsill, sunning itself. They both walked over to it. Bobby tentatively reached out and rubbed his hands across the cat's belly. The cat purred. "Nice," the cat said dreamily. Bobby whipped his hand back.”
― D.J. MacHale, quote from The Quillan Games


“It’s a leadership function. They taught me that at Quantico. The troops have to see you doing the job. They have to know you’re there for them.” And I have to be sure that it’s all real, that I actually am the President.”
― Tom Clancy, quote from Executive Orders


Interesting books

Boundless
(40.3K)
Boundless
by Cynthia Hand
The Shadow of the Torturer
(17.6K)
The Shadow of the To...
by Gene Wolfe
Birthmarked
(42K)
Birthmarked
by Caragh M. O'Brien
The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud
(52K)
The Death and Life o...
by Ben Sherwood
State of Wonder
(143.6K)
State of Wonder
by Ann Patchett
Hallowed
(64.2K)
Hallowed
by Cynthia Hand

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.