Elspeth Huxley · 281 pages
Rating: (4.6K votes)
“How much does one imagine, how much observe? One can no more separate those functions than divide light from air, or wetness from water.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“this was a moment of magic revealing to us all, for a few moments, a hidden world of grace and wonder beyond the one of which our eyes told us, a world that no words could delineate, as insubstanttial as a cloud, as iridescent as a dragon-fly and as innocent as the heart of a rose.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“Tilly was downcast; as with all perfectionists, it was the detail others might not notice that destroyed for her the pleasure of achievement.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“The best way to find out things, if you come to think of it, is not to ask questions at all. If you fire off a question, it is like firing off a gun; bang it goes, and everything takes flight and runs for shelter. But if you sit quite still and pretend not to be looking, all the little facts will come and peck round your feet, situations will venture forth from thickets and intentions will creep out and sun themselves on a stone; and if you are very patient, you will see and understand a great deal more than a man with a gun.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“...that's the way to tell a true story from a made-up one. A made-up story always has a neat and tidy end. But true stories don't end, at least until their heroes and heroines die, and not then really because the things they did and didn't do, sometimes live on.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“What sorts of sin?"
Any sort. When other people commit them, you are startled, but when you commit them yourself, they seem absolutely natural.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
“...when the present stung her, she sought her antidote in the future, which was as sure to hold achievement as the dying flower to hold the fruit when its petals wither.”
― Elspeth Huxley, quote from The Flame Trees of Thika: Memories of an African Childhood
Elspeth Huxley
Born place: in London, The United Kingdom
Born date July 23, 1907
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“If you can only feel safe when everybody else feels, thinks and looks the same as you, then you’re a Hood-damned coward…not to mention a vicious tyrant in the making.”
― Steven Erikson, quote from The Bonehunters
“What are you getting at? I demanded. Are you saying you know somthing about me? For a moment she was quiet. Her pale eyeswandered across my face as if she was searching for somthing she had seen before.
"Let's see. I know your short on friends. I also know your a little strange. I figure you must be pretty bored, or you wouldn't have spent your time following me around. But I know a few other things that might make me think you're interesting."
I couldn't tell wether I should be frightened or flatered. No one had ever said that about me before.
"Is that good or bad?" I asked.
"That, Mrs. Fishbein, is entirely up to you”
― Kirsten Miller, quote from Inside the Shadow City
“Life is like molten glass. It flows, it's flexible, it can be molded and shaped and...what do you say? Ah, yes. It holds vast potential. You have a number of uncertainties in your melt right now. But they will always be there in one form or another. Always. Unlike molten glass, life can't be fixed or frozen into a pretty vase and placed on a shelf to gather dust.”
― Maria V. Snyder, quote from Storm Glass
“Strangers complained about the stench, but the locals liked to brag that it was the sweet smell of money.”
― Donald Ray Pollock, quote from The Devil All the Time
“I just want to say, for the record, as far as Royal protectors go, you're not very good."
"It's my first day," Royce replied dryly.
"And already I am trapped in a timeless prison. I shudder to think what might have happened if you had a whole week.”
― Michael J. Sullivan, quote from The Crown Conspiracy
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