“It is his absence that is part of me and has been for years. This is who I am, perhaps who we all are, keepers of the absent and the dead. It is the blessing and burden of being alive.”
― Camilla Gibb, quote from Sweetness in the Belly
“Once you step inside, history has to be rewritten to include you. A fiction develops a story that weaves you into the social fabric, giving you roots and a local identity. You are assimilated, and in erasing your differences and making you one of their own, the community can maintain belief in its wholeness and purity. After two or three generations, nobody remembers the story is fiction. It has become fact. And this is how history is made.”
― Camilla Gibb, quote from Sweetness in the Belly
“How is it that disappointment arrives as soon as what you have desired for so long steps over the threshold? It’s like finding the end of your wedding train dragging behind in the mud.”
― Camilla Gibb, quote from Sweetness in the Belly
“He wrote the future onto my face with his lips.”
― Camilla Gibb, quote from Sweetness in the Belly
“We were ashes to ashes fascinated by this movement, heaven bound invariably, for there is no hell anymore when it has arrived here on earth.”
― Camilla Gibb, quote from Sweetness in the Belly
“The mighty sturgeon has his pool; The stork upon the dam makes his habitation. Fish in scaly armour, Birds in serried plumes, find protection. In my distress I question that inscrutable expanse: O bowels of earth! O boundless sky! Will ye not hearken to my cry? Above, the twinkling Milky Way; The air cold, Slanting moonlight, The water-clock sunk past midnight. My restless heart grieves still;”
― Cao Xueqin, quote from The Debt of Tears
“I'd never describe even myself as safe when I go into the Magical Realms; no one's safe in there, not even if they're armed and armored with every protective charm on the planet. The place has this habit of changing the rules and pulling the rug from under your feet...."
"Is it carpeted, then?" asked Tharaman.
"What?"
"The Magical Realms, are they carpeted? It's just that you mentioned pulling a rug from somewhere and I just wondered if perhaps..."
"I think it's a figure of speech, my dear," said Krisafitsa. "I do believe it means to be taken by surprise when you least expect it."
"Oh, I see....Odd expression...”
― Stuart Hill, quote from The Last Battle of the Icemark
“Here is a greedy man who keeps to himself
The beautiful pears ripe in his garden.”
― Matsuo Bashō, quote from Backroads to Far Towns: Basho's Travel Journal
“Frederick?
Had she really spoken? Certainly she'd tried, but her voice had failed to materialize and all she heard was the sound of her nightgown ripping as Frederick pulled it over her head and threw it aside.
He was kneeling now between her ankles, pushing at her, forcing her knees apart and then her arms until she was entirely splayed on the bed beneath him.
Nothing was said. Not a word.
Ede felt his hand between her legs, forcing the way for the rest of him. Stop, she wanted to tell him. Stop. I don't understand what you're doing. But nothing - still nothing was said.
He seemed to be raging inside her, moving his hips in a circular fashion, all the weight of his upper body help above her, resting on his arms, his hands pushing down into the mattress.
Stop! But he didn't.
Don't! But he did.
Nothing. Not one word.
The only sound he made was a choking noise in his throat at the end, as tough he might be going to strangle. But when he rolled away from her onto his back, she felt the shudder of his first free breath and she heard him sigh. It was over. Tonight. It was done.
Ede could not bare the thought of seeing him, or of being seen. Still without speaking, she rose from the bed and through the dark, found her way to the bathroom. She had brought the torn nightgown wit her, but when she turned on the light and saw it, she threw it down in the corner. Ruined. Spoiled. Everything.
When at last, she returned to the bed, Fredrick was sound asleep beneath the covers - and nothing - nothing - nothing was said.”
― Timothy Findley, quote from The Piano Man's Daughter
“- Трябва да призная, че се възхитих от вас, професоре. Каквото и да говорим, вие сте единственият истински мъж сред онези безценни изкопаеми. Доколкото разбирам, ние не общувате много сколегите си, нали? Разжбира се, би трябвало да чувствате определена несъвместимост…
- Отново не познахте – процеди Круг, нарушавайки обета за мълчание. – Аз уважавам своите колеги толкова, колкото и себе си. Уважавам ги по две причини: защото умеят да откриват съвършеното щастие в специализирани познания, и защото нямат склонност към физическо насилие.
- Д-р Александър неправилно прие думите му за, както го бяха осведомили, една от типичните за Адам Круг (и забавляващи единствено него) мъгляви остроти, и предпазливо се засмя.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, quote from Bend Sinister
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.
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