Quotes from Postcards from No Man's Land

“He thought: How difficult it is to explain yourself to yourself. Sometimes there only is, and no knowing.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“Is it better to go with the flow or let the flow go?”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“He thought: How difficult it is to explain yourself to yourself. Sometimes there only is, and no knowing.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“What a need we humans have for confession. To a priest, to a friend, to a psychoanalyst, to a relative, to an enemy, even to a torturer when there is no one else, it doesn't matter so long as we speak out what moves within us. Even the most secretive of us do it, if no more than writing in a private diary. And I have often thought as I read stories and novels and poems, especially poems, that they are no more than authors' confessions transformed by their art into something that confesses for us all. Indeed, looking back on my life-long passion for reading, the one activity that has kept me going and given me the most and only lasting pleasure, I think this is the reason that explains why it means so much to me. The books, the authors who matter the most are those who speak to me and speak for me all those things about life I most need to hear as the confession of myself.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“Maybe we should always start everything from the inside and work to the outside, and not from the outside to the inside. What d'you think?”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“Ah, clever clogs, but it will have happened in one of my alternative lives. You know--the lives hot-shot scientists tell us we are living at the same time as this one we know about. Which being so, how do you know that what happens in one of your alternative lives doesn't sometimes leak through into your consciousness in this life, and make you sad that you aren't living that particular alternative life instead of this one? Don't you sometimes feel depressed for no reason you can think of? I do. And maybe that's why. We've had a leak from an alternative life and want that life now. Like wanting an ice cream when you were little, which you knew was in the freezer, but your mom wouldn't let you have it.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“And the price for being a homo-hater should be as high as anyone can pay.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make Man better be;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere:
A lily of a day
Is fairer far in May
Although it fall and die that night;
It was the plant and flower of Light.
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in short measures life may perfect be (Ben Jonson)”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“Yes, even in your mouse moods you only play with the idea of not being." She cleared her throat again. "Biology, you see. It’s because of biology that we want to live and not to die. And it is because of biology that we come to a time when we want to die and not to live.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“L'amore appena nato ha una visione a tunnel della realtà, la sua retina è uno schermo cinematografico, vede il mondo rifatto secondo la sua utopistica interpretazione.”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“«Tu non credi che certe persone dimostrino più coraggio di altre, che siano più valorose e tutto il resto?»
«Tu sì?»
«Be, sì, io penso di sì. Quando leggi di quello che alcuni uomini hanno fatto in questa battaglia, per esempio. Non solo combattendo, ma salvando la vita di altri soldati a rischio della propria. Sono stati capaci di cose che altri non avrebbero mai osato.»
«E che cosa hanno fatto quando sono tornati a casa?»
«Eh?»
«Cosa hanno fatto a casa loro? Come trattavano le loro mogli o le innamorate? Come si comportavano coi colleghi di lavoro?»
[...]
«... lo sai dove voglio arrivare. Non è che io non creda al coraggio o al valore o a cose del genere. Solo che credo che la maggior parte delle persone sia coraggiosa e valorosa ma in modi diversi e in diverse... come si dice? gelegenheden... occasioni.»”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

“And in short measures life may perfect be”
― Aidan Chambers, quote from Postcards from No Man's Land

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― Gary Zukav, quote from The Seat of the Soul

“I’m not sorry for intervening,” she said. “In fact, I’d do it again. But it seems like in choosing to do so, I surrendered my pacifist principles. Am I a hypocrite?” He laid a hand on her knee. “No, Eden. Not a hypocrite. You are a brave, beautiful woman, a guardian of pea . . . of life. You fought only when you had no other option. Truly honorable.”
― Karen Witemeyer, quote from To Win Her Heart

“And what’s the difference between us, that you’ll brush his sins aside and not my own?”
Maati smiled. “You aren’t him,” he said.
“And you love him.”
Maati took a pose of affirmation.
“And love is more important than justice,” Seedless said.
“Sometimes. Yes.”
Seedless smiled and nodded.
“What a terrible thought,” he said. “That love and injustice should be married.”
― Daniel Abraham, quote from A Shadow in Summer

“Puck swung the cannon around in anger. The nozzle spun and hit Sabrina in the chest. The force was so pawerful she was knocked right off the platform and fell backward off the tower. She saw sky above her and felt the wind in her hair. How ironic, she thought, as she fell to her certain death, that at that moment she would have given anything to be a giant goose again.
Air rushed past Sabrina's ears and suddenly she felt her back tingling again. A moment later she was hanging upside down, inches from the ground. She looked up to find her savior, only to find that her her wasn't a person but a long, furry tail sticking out of the back of her pants. It was wrapped around a beam in the tower a kept her swinging there like a monkey.
Puck floated down to her, his wings flapping softly enough to allow him to hover.
"I bet you think this is hilarious. Look what you did to me with your stupid pranks. I have a tail!" she raged.
Puck's face was trembling. "I'm sorry."
"What?" Sabrina said blankly.
"I almost killed you. I'm sorry, Sabrina," he said, rubbing his eyes on his filthy hoodie. He lifted her off the tower and set her on the ground.
"Since when do you care?" Sabrina said, still stunned by the boy's apology.”
― Michael Buckley, quote from The Everafter War

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