Quotes from The Rainbow

“If I were the moon, I know where I would fall down.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Why, oh why must one grow up, why must one inherit this heavy, numbing responsibility of living an undiscovered life? Out of the nothingness and the undifferentiated mass, to make something of herself! But what? In the obscurity and pathlessness to take a direction! But whither? How take even one step? And yet, how stand still? This was torment indeed, to inherit the responsibility of one’s own life.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“But having more freedom she only became more profoundly aware of the big want. She wanted so many things. She wanted to read great, beautiful books, and be rich with them; she wanted to see beautiful things, and have the joy of them for ever; she wanted to know big, free people; and there remained always the want she could put no name to?
It was so difficult. There were so many things, so much to meet and surpass. And one never knew where one was going.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“She looked at him, and oh, the weariness to her, of the
effort to understand another language, the weariness of hearing
him, attending to him, making out who he was, as he stood there
fair-bearded and alien, looking at her. She knew something of
him, of his eyes. But she could not grasp him. She closed her
eyes.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Was his life nothing? Had he nothing to show, no work? He did not count his work, anyone could have done it. What had he known, but the long, marital embrace with his wife. Curious, that this was what his life amounted to! At any rate, it was something, it was eternal. He would say so to anybody, and be proud of it. He lay with his wife in his arms, and she was still his fulfillment, just the same as ever. And that was the be-all and the end-all. Yes, and he was proud of it.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“He felt he had lost it for good, he knew what it was to have been in communication with her, and to be cast off again. In misery, his heart like a heavy stone, he went about unliving.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“And yet - and yet - one's kite will rise on the wind as far as ever one has string to let it go. It tugs and tugs and will go, and one is glad the further it goes, even if everybody else is nasty about it.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“He worked very hard, till nothing lived in him but his eyes.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Their words were only accidents in the mutual silence.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“She turned, and saw a great white moon looking at her over the hill. And her breast opened to it, she was cleaved like a transparent jewel to its light. She stood filled with the full moon, offering herself. Her two breasts opened to make way for it, her body opened wide like a quivering anemone, a soft, dilated invitation touched by the moon.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“In the superficial activity of her life, she was all English. She even thought in English. But her long blanks and darkness of abstraction were Polish.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Till gradually he became desperate, lost his understanding, was plunged in a revolt that knew no bounds. Inarticulate, he moved with her at the Marsh in violent, gloomy, wordless passion, almost in hatred of her.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“...a temple was never perfectly a temple, till it was ruined and mixed up with the winds and the sky and the herbs.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“And she shrank away again, back into her darkness, and for a long while remained blotted safely away from living.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“...she was walking along the bottom-most bed--she was quite safe: quite safe, if she had to go on and on for ever, seeing this was the very bottom, and there was nothing deeper. There was nothing deeper, you see, so one could not but feel certain, passive.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“ploughing, and clung to their feet with a weight that pulled like desire, lying hard and unresponsive when the crops were to be shorn away. The young corn”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“The last year of her college career was wheeling slowly round. She could see ahead her examination and her departure. She had the ash of disillusion gritting under her teeth. Would the next move turn out the same? Always the shining doorway ahead; and then, upon approach, always the shining doorway was a gate into another ugly yard, dirty and active and dead. Always the crest of the hill gleaming ahead under heaven: and then, from the top of the hill only another sordid valley full of amorphous, squalid activity.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“They were mere permutations of known quantities. There was no roundness or fullness in this world he now inhabited, everything was a dead shape mental arrangement, without life or being.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Why must one climb the hill ? Why must one climb? Why not stay below? Why force one’s way up the slope? Why force one’s way up and up, when one is at the bottom? Oh, it was very tiring, very wearying, very burdensome. Always burdens, always, always burdens.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“She liked Anthony, though. All her life, at intervals, she returned to the thought of him and of that which he offered. But she was a traveller, she was a traveller on the face of the earth, and he was an isolated creature living in the fulfilment of his own senses. She”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“But still she was motionless, like a curled up, oblivious creature. His heart beat with strange throes of pain. Then, by a motion under his hand, he knew she was crying, holding herself hard so that her tears should not be known. He waited. The tension continued—perhaps she was not crying—then suddenly relapsed with a sharp catch of a sob. His heart flamed with love and suffering for her. Kneeling carefully on the bed, so that his earthy boots should not touch it, he took her in his arms to comfort her. The sobs gathered in her, she was sobbing bitterly. But not to him. She was still away from him. He held her against his breast, whilst she sobbed, withheld from him, and all his body vibrated against her. "Don't cry—don't cry," he said, with an odd simplicity. His heart was calm and numb with a sort of innocence of love, now. She still sobbed, ignoring him, ignoring that he held her. His lips were dry. "Don't cry, my love," he said, in the same abstract way. In his breast his heart burned like a torch, with suffering. He could not bear the desolateness of her crying. He would have soothed her with his blood. He heard the church clock chime, as if it touched him, and he waited in suspense for it to have gone by. It was quiet again. "My love," he said to her, bending to touch her wet face with his mouth. He was afraid to touch her. How wet her face was! His body trembled as he held her. He loved her till he felt his heart and all his veins would burst and flood her with his hot, healing blood. He knew his blood would heal and restore her. She was becoming quieter. He thanked the God of mercy that at last she was becoming quieter. His head felt so strange and blazed. Still he held her close, with trembling arms. His blood seemed very strong, enveloping her. And at last she began to draw near to him, she nestled to him. His limbs, his body, took fire and beat up in flames. She clung to him, she cleaved to his body. The flames swept him, he held her in sinews of fire. If she would kiss him! He bent his mouth down. And her mouth, soft and moist, received him. He felt his veins would burst with anguish of thankfulness, his heart was mad with gratefulness, he could pour himself out upon her for ever. When they came to themselves, the night was very dark. Two hours had gone by. They lay still and warm and weak, like the new-born, together. And there was a silence almost of the unborn. Only his heart was weeping happily, after the pain. He did not understand, he had yielded, given way. There was no understanding. There could be only acquiescence and submission, and tremulous wonder of consummation. The”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“In his dark eyes was a deep misery which he wore with the same ease and pleasantness as he wore his close-sitting clothes.”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“Then what do you feel? It's all such a nothingness, what you feel and what you don't feel." "What”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

“She was glad of the rain's privacy and intimacy. Making”
― D.H. Lawrence, quote from The Rainbow

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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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