They Said Quotes (page 21)
My letters! all dead paper, mute and white! And yet they seem alive and quivering. Against my tremulous hands which loose the string. And let them drop down on my knee to-night. This said, -- he wished to have me in his sight. Once, as a friend: this fixed a day in spring. To come and touch my hand ... a simple thing, Yet I wept for it! -- this, ... the paper's light ... Said, Dear I love thee; and I sank and quailed. As if God's future thundered on my past. This said, I am thine -- and so...
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Vera had not sensed my approach. She was peering into the instrument and turning knobs with child-like seriousness and ineptitude. It was obvious that she had never used a microscope before. I stole closer to her, and then I said, "Boo!"She jerked her head away from the eyepiece."Hello," I said."You scared me to death," she said."Sorry," I said, and I laughed. These ancient games go on and on. It's nice they do.
Kurt Vonnegut
Before he reached the door the old man called to him again. The boy turned and stood. The matrix will not help you, the old man said. He said to catch the wolf the boy should find that place where the acts of God and those of man are of one piece. Where they cannot be distinguished... The old man said that it was not a question of finding such a place but rather of knowing it when it presented itself. He said that it was at such places that God sits and conspires in the destruction of...
Cormac McCarthy
Good morning," said the little prince. Good morning," said the merchant. This was a merchant who sold pills that had been invented to quench thirst. You need only swallow one pill a week, and you would feel no need for anything to drink. Why are you selling those?" asked the little prince. Because they save a tremendous amount of time," said the merchant. "Computations have been made by experts. With these pills, you save fifty-three minutes in every week."And what do I do with those...
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Angelina, Alicia, and Katie suddenly giggled. "What?" said Wood, frowning at this lighthearted behavior. "He's that tall, good-looking one, isn't he?" said Angelina. "Strong and silent," said Katie, and they started to giggle again."He's only silent because he's too thick to string two words together," said Fred impatiently.
J. K. Rowling
And Castle nodded sagely. 'So this is a picture of the meaninglessness of it all! I couldn't agree more.'
'Do you really agree?' I asked. 'A minute ago you said something about Jesus.'
'Who?' said Castle.
'Jesus Christ?'
'Oh,' said Castle. 'Him.' He shrugged. 'People have to talk about something just to keep their voice boxes in working order, so they'll have good voice boxes in case there's ever anything really meaningful to say.'
'I see.' I knew I wasn't going to have an easy time...
Kurt Vonnegut
GOOD MORNING," said the little prince. "Good Morning," said the salesclerk. This was a salesclerk who sold pills invented to quench thirst. Swallow one a week and you no longer feel any need to drink."Why do you sell these pills?"They save so much time," the salesclerk said. "Experts have calculated that you can save fifty-three minutes a week."And what do you do with those fifty-three minutes?"Whatever you like."If I had fifty-three minutes to spend as I liked," the little prince said to...
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
I love you, Eliza,” I said.
She thought about it. “No,” she said at last, “I don’t like it.”
“Why not?” I said.
“It’s as though you were pointing a gun at my head,” she said. “It’s just a way of getting somebody to say something they probably don’t mean. What else can I say, or anybody say, but, ‘I love you, too’?
Kurt Vonnegut
She liked me because she said that we both hated everything and knew that friendship was an act of desperation. She said that for a man I was alright. She said that people were half-way and if it was up to her a lot of people would get killed and a lot of men would be walking around without their balls. She said that they should go on sale for women to hang off their rearview mirrors.
Henry Rollins
The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are things you get ashamed of, because words make them smaller. When they were in your head they were limitless; but when they come out they seem to be no bigger than normal things. But that's not all. The most important things lie too close to wherever your secret heart is buried; they are clues that could guide your enemies to a prize they would love to steal. It's hard and painful for you to talk about these things ... and then...
Stephen King
Anyway, said Robert, they got a big fright. After that they started dropping pellets in the water and digging latrines and spraying for flies and bringing buckets of soap. But do you think they do it because they love us? Not a hope. They prefer it that we live because we look too terrible when we get sick and die. If we grew thin and turned into paper and then into ash and floated away, they wouldn't give a stuff for us. They just don't want to get upset. They want to go to sleep feeling good.
J. M. Coetzee
After all has been said that can be said about the widening influence of ideas, it remains true that they would hardly be such strong agents unless they were taken in a solvent of feeling. The great world-struggle of developing thought is continually foreshadowed in the struggle of the affections, seeking a justification for love and hope.
George Eliot
Where was I?"A different island," said old Tallow. Her voice was stern, but there was an ache in her look that Omakayas had never before seen. "An island called Spirit Island where everyone but you died of the itching sickness- you were the toughest one, the littlest one, and you survived them all."You were sent here so you could save the others," she said. "Because you'd had the sickness, you were strong enough to nurse them through it. They did a good thing when they took you in, and...
Louise Erdrich