Quotes from The Book of the Dun Cow

“Sorrow spoken lends a little courage to the speaker.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“Her ballad did nothing to make the serpants lovely. Her ballad hid nothing of their dread. But the music itself spoke of faith and certainty; the melody announced the presence of God.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“A grudge may be strong. But a grudge isn't strength!”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“How many battles make a war?”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“He went wordless, and wordless he sat beside her. He knew the size of her sorrow.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“Aye. He wills that I work his work in this place. Indeed. I am left behind to labor. Right
'And one day he may show his face beneath his damnable clouds to tell me what that work might be; what's worth so many tears; what's so important in his sight that is needs to be done this way...
'O my sons!'Chauntecleer suddenly wailed at the top of his lungs, a light flaring before it goes out: 'How much I want you with me!”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“But a good novel is first of all an event; as distinguished from the continuous rush of many sensations and the messy overlapping experiences of our daily lives, it is a composed experience in which all sensations are tightly related, for which there is a beginning and an ending, within which the reader’s perceivings and interpretations are shaped for a while by the internal integrity of all the elements of the narrative.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“WELL, THEN SHAG IT, YOU SUITCASE! GET OVER HERE!”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“: “Behold the Rooster who suffers much more than he must. Ah, Chauntecleer, Chauntecleer. Why do you suffer today and tomorrow?” oozed the compassionate voice. “Curse God. Curse him, and all will be done. Or, lest you forget the truth of things, remember: I am Wyrm. And I am here.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“How can the meek of the earth save themselves against the damnable evil which feeds on them?”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“Almost as evil as the stench was the silence. Senex, however poorly he had ended his rule, had always remembered the canonical crows. He sang them, to be sure, in a disoriented manner; but he did sing them, keeping his animals that way, banding them, unifying them.

But Cockatrice never crowed the canon. So under him the day lost its meaning and its direction, and the animals lost any sense of time or purpose. Their land became strange to them. A terrible feeling of danger entered their souls, of things undone, of treasures unprotected. They were tired all the day long, and at night they did not sleep. And it was a most pitiful sight to see, how they all went about with hunched shoulders, heads tucked in, limping here and there as if they were forever walking into an ill wind, and flinching at every sound as if the wind carried arrows.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

“Her eyes were liquid with compassion—deep, deep, as the earth is deep. Her brow knew his suffering and knew, besides that, worlds more. But the goodness was that, though this wide brow knew so much, yet it bent over his pain alone and creased with it.”
― Walter Wangerin Jr., quote from The Book of the Dun Cow

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Popular quotes

“I am God, la de dah.”
― Anne Sexton, quote from The Complete Poems

“İdam sehpasının birkaç metre ötesinden, Saint-Jean-Decolle tarikatından dört keşiş, siyah kukuletaları, kaba kumaştan giysileri içinde, idam mahkûmlarına işkence yapılmasından sorumlu bu dört din adamı, mahkûmlar kilisesinden, Beatrice'in babasının ikinci eşini -baba katlinde suç ortağı ve ensest olayının tanığı olan kişiyi çıkarıyorlardı.
İlk o ölecekti. Kadın ayakta duramıyordu; onu baltaya götürecek olan güvenlik görevlilerinin oluşturduğu çitin arasında bitkindi. İki keşiş onu koltuk altlarından tutuyordu. Ötekisi de ölüme layıkıyla gitmesini salık veren sözler söylüyordu kulağına. Sonuncusu ise, onun yüzü hizasında bir ayna tutar gibi, idam sehpasını görmesini engelleyen, boyalı bir tahta levha tutuyordu. Bu tahta üzerinde Vaftizci Yahya'nın (Saint-Jean-Baptise) gümüş tepsi içindeki kesik başının tasviri vardı. Acıdan tükenmiş haldeydi, elinde baltasıyla onu bekleyen celladı görünce, mahkûm kadın bayıldı. Sehpaya çıkardıkları, bilinci yerinde olmayan zavallı bir kadındı. Onu kesme kütüğüne yatırdılar. Görülecek ne var gerisinde? Gerisi kasaplık. Asıl dram sonrasındaydı. Kiliseden tek başına, hızla ilerleyen, Beatrice'in silueti çıktı. Bütün kent haykırdı. Acıma, hayranlık, öfke; bütün Roma, hapishanelerinden saraylarına dek aynı heyecanla sarsılmış gibiydi.
İdam sehpasının altındaki ressam grubu hariç; onlar, ses çıkarmadan oldukları yerde kaldılar. Ellerinde kâğıt kalemleri, en küçük bir ayrıntıyı kaçırmamak kaygısı içindeydiler. İnsanlar; üç dört hatta beş kadar idama alışık olsalar da, kutlamalar öncesi bir dönemde, böylesi güzel ve soylu bir kadının idam edilmesi sık rastlanan bir durum değildi.
Bu neredeyse bir çocuktu, yapılan işkencelere dokuz saat boyunca dayandığı söyleniyordu ve oradaki herkes onu masum buluyordu. Roma halkı, kalabalığın içinden dimdik, kendinden emin, Tanrıya dualar ederek Papaya hakaretler okuyarak ilerleyen bu genç kızın gösterdiği yüreklilikte, Reform karşıtlarının, Katolikler anısına Hıristiyan sanatçılara sipariş ettikleri, Sainte Catherine, Sainte Ursula ve Sainte Cecile gibi azizeleri görmekteydi.
Hemen sonrasında bir sessizlik oldu. Genç kız kafasını kesme kütüğüne koydu. Celladın kollarını havaya kaldırdığı görüldü. Baltanın gün ışığında yalkın verdiği görüldü. Yalnızca bunlar görüldü: güneş, balta ve Saint-Pierre Kilisesi'nin kubbesi. Kollar tekrar aşağı indi. Boğuk bir çarpma sesi duyulur gibi oldu. Halk haykırdı. Baba despotluğunun ve papa haksızlığının kurbanı bir genç kızın kafasını gördüklerinde, korku, acıma, öfke ve kin dolu bir çığlık yükseldi.
Gösteriyi yakından izlemeyi başarmış olan ressamlar arasında soğukkanlılığını koruyabilen iki kişi vardı. Bir baba ve kızı. Orazio Gentileschi ve küçük Artemisia.”
― Alexandra Lapierre, quote from Artemisia

“George you were very very bad to run away from Alice. Very bad But you were very good to stomp Sinclair when he was being a dick so I think we'll call this a wash.”
― MaryJanice Davidson, quote from Undead and Unappreciated

“Alone. She realized how much she had missed the luxury of solitude, and knew that its occasional comfort would always be essential to her. The pleasure of being on one's own was not so much spiritual as sensuous, like wearing silk, or swimming without a bathing suit, or walking along a totally empty beach with the sun on your back. One was restored by solitude. Refreshed.”
― Rosamunde Pilcher, quote from Coming Home

“Americans are suckers for an English accent.”
― John Irving, quote from The Fourth Hand

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