Edward Albee · 272 pages
Rating: (53.1K votes)
“I said I was impressed, Martha. I'm beside myself with jealousy. What do you want me to do, throw up?”
“Martha: Truth or illusion, George; you don't know the difference.
George: No, but we must carry on as though we did.
Martha: Amen.”
“Dashed hopes and good intentions. Good, better, best, bested.”
“George, who is out somewhere there in the dark, who is good to me - whom I revile, who can keep learning the games we play as quickly as I can change them. Who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy. And yes, I do wish to be happy. George and Martha: Sad, sad, sad. Whom I will not forgive for having come to rest; for having seen me and having said: “Yes, this will do”. Who has made the hideous, the hurting, the insulting mistake of loving… me, and must be punished for it. George and Martha… Sad, sad, sad.”
“You want to dance with me, angel tits?”
“Martha: Oh, I like your anger. I think that's what I like about you most. Your anger.”
“And the west, encumbered by crippling alliances, and hardened with a morality too rigid to accommodate itself to the swing of events, must ..... eventually ..... fall.”
“You don't see anything, do you? You see everything but the goddamn mind; you see all the little specs and crap, but you don't see what goes on, do you?”
“HONEY: (Apologetically, holding up her brandy bottle) I peel labels.
GEORGE: We all peel labels, sweetie; and when you get through the skin, all three layers, through the muscle, slosh aside the organs (An aside to NICK) them which is still sloshable--(Back to HONEY) and get down to bone...you know what you do then?
HONEY: (Terribly interested) No!
GEORGE: When you get down to bone, you haven't got all the way, yet. There's something inside the bone...the marrow...and that's what you gotta get at. (A strange smile at MARTHA)”
“You...you've been here quite a long time, haven't you?"
What? Oh...yes. Ever since I married What's-her-name. Uh, Martha. Even before that. Forever. Dashed hopes, and good intentions. Good, better, best, bested. How do you like that for a declension, young man?”
“Musical beds is the faculty sport around here.”
“I am a doctor. A.B.... M.A.... PH.D....ABMAPHID! Abmaphid has been variously described as a wasting disease of the frontal lobes, and as a wonder drug. It is actually both.I'm really very mistrustful.”
“Martha: ... I cry allllll the time; but deep inside, so no one can see me. I cry all the time. And Georgie cries all the time, too. We both cry all the time, and then what we do, we cry, and we take our tears, and we put 'em in the ice box, in the goddamn ice trays until they're all frozen and then... we put them... in our... drinks.”
“...who tolerates, which is intolerable; who is kind, which is cruel; who understands, which is beyond comprehension...”
“George who is out somewhere there in the dark... George who is good to me, and whom I revile; who understands me, and whom I push off; who can make me laugh, and I choke it back in my throat; who can hold me, at night, so that it's warm, and whom I will bite so there's blood; who keeps learning the games we play as quickly as I can change the rules; who can make me happy and I do not wish to be happy, and yes I do wish to be happy. George and Martha: sad, sad, sad... whom I will not forgive for having come to rest; for having seen me and having said: yes; this will do; who has made the hideous, the hurting, the insulting mistake of loving me and must be punished for it. George and Martha: sad, sad, sad... who tolerates, which is intolerable; who is kind, which is cruel; who understands, which is beyond comprehension...”
“There's no limit to you, is there?”
“Alright... what do you want me to say? Do you want me to say it’s funny, so you can contradict me and say it’s sad? Or do you want me to say it’s sad so you can turn around and say no, it’s funny. You can play that damn little game any way you want to, you know!”
“Awww, 'tis the refuge we take when the unreality of the world weighs too heavy on our tiny heads.”
“Пьем за слепое духовное око, за сердечный покой и за цирроз печени.”
“The most profound indication of social malignancy ... no sense of humor. None of the monoliths could take a joke.”
“Quietness rose within Aquila, easing his wild unrest as the salve was cooling the smart of his gashed side. But that was always the way with Brother Ninnias-- the quietness, the sense of sanctuary, were things that he carried with him.”
“Lenore had pushed her into had been a complete disaster.”
“Was that justice?” she said. She sounded as though she honestly wanted to know.”
“Best Day’, which touchingly evokes a childhood full of wonder, she sings of her ‘excellent’ father whose ‘strength is making me stronger’. That excellent father is Scott Kingsley Swift, who studied business”
“I hardly think a girl is much of a threat. I presume you searched her for weapons? But if she attempts to suffocate me with her straw mattress, I promise to call out for help.”
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