Quotes from Midwives

Chris Bohjalian ·  374 pages

Rating: (139.7K votes)


“Everything about [chance] scares the bejesus out of so many people; it's the this thing they try to avoid at all costs. Don't travel to the Middle East these days - there's a chance something could happen. Don't get involved with that new fellow on Creamery Street - I hear a lot of mud was scraped off his floor after the divorce. Don't have your baby at home - there's a a chance something could go wrong. Don't don't don't... Well, you can't live your life like that! You can't spend your entire life avoiding chance. It's out there, it's inescapable, it's a part of the soul of the world. There are no sure things in this universe, and it's absolutely ridiculous to try and live like there are!”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives


“No one said living isn't a pretty chancy business, Sibyl. No one gets out of here alive.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives


“Boys look at us like we look at horses: color, height, eyes. tail. They can't help but have preferences.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives


“Then there were those girls who became midwives: girls who could not get enough of the tiniest of babies - girls who would grow into women who absolutely reveled in the magnificent process of birth...The difference between a woman who becomes an OB and the women who becomes and midwife has less to do with education, philosophy or upbringing than with the depth of her appreciation for the miracle of labor and for life in its moment of emergence.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives


“...we were too young- and the ground too muddy- for our small part of the earth to move.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives



“When the sun is strong and the air is warm, however, we shout greetings to one another down the lengths of long driveways and from the windows of our cars as we pass; we hold our heads high as we walk, staring up into the sky with our eyes shut and our faces widened by smiles. We breathe in deeply the summery air, but this sort of inhalation doesn’t result in a sigh; it’s a precursor to a purr, or the moans one might make during a backrub. We no longer mope, we no longer grouse. We are filled with energy. Although”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives


About the author

Chris Bohjalian
Born place: in White Plains, New York, The United States
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Experts depend on the fact that you don’t have the information they do. Or that you are so befuddled by the complexity of their operation that you wouldn’t know what to do with the information if you had it. Or that you are so in awe of their expertise that you wouldn’t dare challenge them.”
― Steven D. Levitt, quote from Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything (Freakonomics, #1)


“Absolutely nothing brings out the killer instinct in the upper crust of New York Society like a charity function.”
― Caleb Carr, quote from The Alienist


“What happened was: they became a team, a family of two. There had been times before they ran away when they acted like a team, but those were very different from feeling like a team. Becoming a team didn't mean the end of their arguments. But it did mean that the arguments became a part of the adventure, became discussions not threats. To an outsider the arguments would appear to be the same because feeling like part of a team is something that happens invisibly. You might call it caring. You could even call it love. And it is very rarely, indeed, that it happens to two people at the same time-- especially a brother and a sister who had always spent more time with activities than they had with each other.”
― E.L. Konigsburg, quote from From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler


“Jestliže se chceš dotknout srdce nějakého člověka, musíš vidět jeho tvář. Do duše se nedostaneš telefonem.”
― Chaim Potok, quote from My Name Is Asher Lev


“Too late to apologize, I've already forgiven you.”
― Robin Hobb, quote from Assassin's Apprentice


Interesting books

Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda
(9.1K)
Shake Hands with the...
by Roméo Dallaire
Black and Blue
(71.9K)
Black and Blue
by Anna Quindlen
Bleeding Violet
(5.2K)
Bleeding Violet
by Dia Reeves
Demon Lord of Karanda
(33.8K)
Demon Lord of Karand...
by David Eddings
The Humans
(29.4K)
The Humans
by Matt Haig
The Gone-Away World
(9.9K)
The Gone-Away World
by Nick Harkaway

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.