Quotes from Star of the Sea

“Love and freedom are such hideous words. So many cruelties have been done in their name.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“Everything is in the way the material is composed.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“They had no previous connection whatever with Connemara; but they saw connections where others who should have seen them simply looked the other way.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“They had far more in common than either realised. One was born Catholic, the other Protestant. One was born Irish, the other British. But neither was the greatest difference between them. One was born rich and the other poor.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“That each man is the sum of his choices is nothing less than the truth. And each, perhaps, is also something else.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“Any assemblage comprising human beings, any family, any party, any tribe, any nation, will bind itself together not by what it shares but ultimately by what it fears, which is often so much greater. Perhaps it abhors the outsider as camouflage for its own alarms; dreading what it would do to itself were the binding to fall asunder.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“It is not a matter of ends justifying means: but of the creation of new means and new ends.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“How the prisoner and the immigrant are treated by the government, how the poor are treated and those without influence: this is secretly how the government would like to treat us all.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“Politics' the polite word for antediluvian prejudices, the rags put on by enmity and tribal resentment.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“It was mankind and not the Almighty that had ordered the universe; only a man could look at an accident and call it a creation with Himself at the centre.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“...but as his father used to say when he had a few drinks taken, you couldn't expect bloody miracles when you were talking about God.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“Truly the angels are come among us every day. Our difficulty is so often that in our vanity and worldliness we so utterly fail to recognise them for what they are.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“We still tell each other that we are lucky to be alive, when our being alive has almost nothing to do with luck, but with geography, pigmentation, and international exchange rates.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

“Boredom is a bit of a bore, to say the least.”
― Joseph O'Connor, quote from Star of the Sea

About the author

Popular quotes

“This hill, though high, I covet to ascend;
The difficulty will not me offend.
For I perceive the way to life lies here.
Come, pluck up, heart; let's neither faint nor fear.
Better, though difficult, the right way to go,
Than wrong, though easy, where the end is woe.”
― John Bunyan, quote from The Pilgrim's Progress

“And, most vivid of all, there was the dramatic epic of the rats - the scampering army of obscene vermin which had burst forth from the castle three months after the tragedy that doomed it to desertion - the lean, filthy, ravenous army which had swept all before it and devoured fowl, cats, dogs, hogs, sheep, and even two hapless human beings before its fury was spent.”
― H.P. Lovecraft, quote from Tales of H.P. Lovecraft

“I was right." She dropped the sword and grabbed Helen in a hug. Then she started jumping up and down, making Helen jump with her. "You're not dead! This is... You have no idea how happy I am I didn't just kill you!" she squealed.”
― Josephine Angelini, quote from Starcrossed

“لم تعد لدي دموع لأذرفها فقد نفدت منذ زمن طويل، ولكن ألماً جديداً ووعياً جديداً ولدا في داخلي. بدأ الغموض المتوطن في داخلي يتبخر، وزال الألم الذي شعر به الولد الصغير الذي حدق في المرآة. لقد استيقظت إنسانيتي الخاصة، وصعدت لتحييني بمصافحة، فيما راقبت بزوغ نور الشمس الأول فوق الأفق. قلت لنفسي إن هناك فرقاً كبيراً بين الموت والحياة، وأن أعظم هدية يمكن أن يعطيها الإنسان لشخص آخر هي الحياة، وأن أعظم خطيئة يمكن أن يرتكبها الإنسان بحق شخص آخر هي سلب هذه الحياة، إلى جانب ذلك، فإن جميع القوانين والأديان تصبح شيئاً ثانوياً .. مجرد كلمات ومعتقدات يختار الناس الإيمان بها والكره والقتل باسمها. لن أعيش حياتي على هذا النحو، وآمل أن أولادي لن يعيشوا كذلك أيضاً”
― James McBride, quote from The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother

“Who am I?’ you mean.” He smiled at the question and gave what was at first glance a most oblique answer. “Do you know what a fugue is?” “Are you changing the subject?” “No.” I thought in silence for some distance before his answer arranged itself sensibly in my mind. “I see. Two discrete sections of a fugue may not appear related, unless the listener has received the entire work, at which time the music’s internal logic makes clear the relationship.” “A conversation with you is most invigorating, Russell.”
― Laurie R. King, quote from The Beekeeper's Apprentice

Interesting books

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.