“…everything has a past. Everything – a person, an object, a word, everything. If you don’t know the past, you can’t understand the present and plan properly for the future.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from Davita's Harp
“In our time... a man whose enemies are faceless bureaucrats almost never wins. It is our equivalent to the anger of the gods in ancient times. But those gods you must understand were far more imaginative than our tiny bureaucrats. They spoke from mountaintops not from tiny airless offices. They rode clouds. They were possessed of passion. They had voices and names. Six thousand years of civilization have brought us to this.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from Davita's Harp
“Did he really believe God wrote stories that were open to one explanation only? A story that knew but one explanation could hardly be interesting and was certainly not worth the trouble of remembering.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from Davita's Harp
“Good-bye, Davita. Be discontented with the world. But be respectful at the same time.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from Davita's Harp
“I like his optimism,' I said. 'I like the way when he and some other rabbis saw a jackal in the ruins of Jerusalem, and the others began to cry, he laughed and said that just as the prophecy of the destruction of the temple was fulfilled, so the prophecy of the rebuilding would also be fulfilled. I like that.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from Davita's Harp
Chaim Potok
Born place: in Buffalo, New York, The United States
Born date February 17, 1929
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“As we will see from these pages man is mostly innocent, really potentially good, even naturally noble; and as we will stress, society is responsible, largely, for shaping people, for giving them opportunities for unfolding more freely and more unafraid. But this unfolding is confused and complicated by man’s basic animal fears: by his deep and indelible anxieties about his own impotence and death, and his fear of being overwhelmed and sucked up into the world and into others. All this gives his life a quality of drivenness, of underlying desperation, an obsession with the meaning of it and with his own significance as a creature. And this is what drives him to try to make his mark on the world, to try to twist it and turn it to his own designs, to bury over the rumbling anxieties; and this usually means that he tries to twist and turn others, make his mark on them, use them to justify his own problematic life. As Rank put it so bluntly: Man creates “out of freedom a prison.” This means everyman, in any society, from the most “primitive” to the most “civilized,” no matter what the child training programs or economic system.”
― Ernest Becker, quote from The Birth and Death of Meaning: An Interdisciplinary Perspective on the Problem of Man
“All will be well, if we do what is right”
― Dean Koontz, quote from Breathless
“He reached up without thinking to assist Siena with hands on her waist. He did not realize until she hesitated that she might interpret the gesture as somewhat demeaning to her undoubtedly excellent ability to take care of herself. But she reached for his shoulders a moment later, moving into his hands as he lowered her to the floor easily.
“Do not worry,” she assured him softly as she linked her fingers through his and squeezed his hand. “I sometimes forget that you were born when men were gentlemen. However, I think it could grow on me.”
“I am glad to hear that,” he said with a grin. “However, I am wholeheartedly willing to forgo gentlemanly manners and let the door hit you in the ass at your immediate request.”
“You are too kind,” she laughed.”
― Jacquelyn Frank, quote from Elijah
“Той се ожени за нея, защото просто така се случи. Главният виновник за техния съюз беше едно пътуване до планината в нейната компания, плюс дебелия й брат и изключително атлетичната й братовчедка, която, слава богу, си изкълчи глезена в Понтресина. Имаше нещо толкова изискано, толкова ефирно в Елизабет, а смехът й бе така добродушен! За да избегнат набезите на множеството си берлински познати, те се ожениха в Мюнхен. Кестените тъкмо цъфтяха. Една много скъпа табакера се изгуби в тайнствена градина. Един от келнерите в хотела говореше седем езика. Оказа се, че Елизабет има нежен малък белег от операция на апандисит.
Тя беше вярна малка душичка, хрисима и нежна. Любовта й беше като бяла лилия, но понякога избухваше в пламъци и в такива моменти Албинус се самозалъгваше, че не му трябва никоя друга.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, quote from Laughter in the Dark
“But I know that in order to get to the end of a thing, one must start at the beginning.”
― Michelle Zink, quote from Guardian of the Gate
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