Tag: English

Quotes

Quotes from A Single Man – Christopher Isherwood

Geoff W

“With that body which sprawled stark naked, gaping wide in shameless demand, underneath Jim’s nude body? Gross in sucking vulva, sly truthless greedy flesh, in all the bloom and gloss and arrogant resilience of youth, demanding that George shall step aside, bow down and yield to the female prerogative, hide his unnatural head in shame. I am Doris. I am woman. I am Bitch. Mother. Nature. The Church and the Law and the State exist to support me. I claim my biological rights.” – 95-96

“He pictures the evening he might have spent, snugly at home, fixing the food he has bought, then lying down on the couch beside the bookcase and reading himself slowly sleepy. At first glance this is an absolutely convincing and charming scene of domestic contentment. Only after a few instants does George notice the omission that makes it meaningless. What is left out of the picture is Jim lying opposite him at the other end of the couch, also reading; the two of them absorbed in their books yet so completely aware of each others’ presence.” – 114-115

“Thinking what an absurd and universally accepted bit of nonsense it is that your best friends must necessarily be the ones who best understand you. As if there weren’t far too much understanding in the world already; above all, that understanding between lovers, celebrated in song and story, which is actually such torture that no two of them can bear it without frequent separations or fights.” – 122-123

“As for Geo, these waves are much too big for him. They seem truly tremendous, towering up, blackness unrolling itself out of blackness, mysteriously and awfully sparkling, then curing over in a thundering slap of foam which is sparked with phosphorus.” – 162

“I’m like a book you have to read. A book can’t read itself to you. It doesn’t even know what it’s about. I don’t know what I’m about.” – 176

Quotes

Quotes from The Well of Loneliness – Radclyffe Hall

Geoff W

“The subtlety, the craftiness of that question which in common decency could have but one answer! Oh, well, she had gone and would go even farther. Raftery was dead, there was nothing to hold her, she was free–what a terrible thing could be freedom. Trees were free when they were uprooted by the wind; ships were free when they were torn from their moorings; men were free when they were cast out of their homes–free to starve, free to perish of cold and hunger.” – 234-235

“And now quite often while she waited at the stations for the wounded, she would see unmistakable figures–unmistakable to her they would be at first sight, she would single them out of the crowd as by instinct. For as though gaining courage from the terror that is war, many a one who was even as Stephen, had crept out of her hole and come into the daylight, come into the daylight and faced her country: ‘Well, here I am, will you take me or leave me?’ And England had taken her, asking no questions–she was strong and efficient, she could fill a man’s place, she could organize too, given scope for her talent. England had said: ‘Thank you very much. you’re just what we happened to want…at the moment’.” – 270-271

“Our love may be faithful even unto death and beyond–yet the world will call it unclean. We may harm no living creature by our love; we may grow more perfect in understanding and in charity because of our loving; but all this will not save you from the scourge of a world that will turn away its eyes from your noblest actions, finding only corruption and vileness in you. You will see men and women defiling each other, laying the burden of their sins upon their children. You will see unfaithfulness, lies and deceit among those whom the world views with approbation. You will find that many have grown hard of heart, have grown greedy, selfish, cruel and lustful; and then you will turn to me and will say: ‘You and I are more worthy of respect than these people. Why does the world persecute us, Stephen?’ And I shall answer: ‘Because in this world there is only toleration for the so-called normal’.” – 301

“Remembering Mary, remembering Morton, her pen covered sheet after sheet of paper; she wrote with the speed of true inspiration, and at times her work brushed the hem of greatness.” – 342

” ‘They are good, these doctors–some of them very good; they work hard trying to solve our problem, but half the time they must work in the dark–the whole truth is known only to the normal invert. The doctors cannot make the ignorant think, cannot hope to bring home the sufferings of millions; only one of ourselves can some day do that…It will need great courage but it will be done, because all things must work toward ultimate good; there is no real wastage and no destruction.’ He lit a cigarette and started thoughtfully at her for a moment or two. Then he touched her hand. ‘Do you comprehend? There is no destruction’.” – 390

“As for those who were ashamed to declare themselves, lying low for the sake of a peaceful existence, she utterly despised such of them as had brais; they were traitors to themselves and their fellows, she insisted. For the sooner the world came to realize that fine brains very frequently went with inversion, the sooner it would have to withdraw its ban, and the sooner would cease this persecution. Persecution was always a hideous thing, breeding hideous thoughts–and such thoughts were dangerous.” – 406-407

Quotes

Quotes from A Spot of Bother – Mark Haddon

Geoff W

“…she was melting into that dark behind her eyelids, the way butter melted in a hot pan, the way you melted back into sleep after waking up at night, just letting it take you.” – 56

“He was at a crossroads. What he did over the next few days would set the course for the rest of his life. He wanted people to like him. And people did like him. Or they used to. But it wasn’t so easy any more. It wasn’t automatic. He was beginning to lose the benefit of everyone’s doubt. His own included. If he wasn’t careful he’d turn into one of those men who cared more about furniture than human beings. He’d end up living with someone else who cared more about furniture than human beings and they’d lead a life which looked perfectly normal from the outside but was, in truth, a kind of living death, that left your heart looking like a raisin.” – 258-259

“At teenage parties he was always wandering into the garden, sitting on a bench in the dark, smoking Camel cigarettes, the lit windows behind him and the faint strains of ‘Hi, Ho, Silver Lining’ thumping away, staring up at the constellations and pondering all those big questions about the existence of God and the nature of evil and the mystery of death, questions which seemed more important than anything else in the world until a few years passed and some real questions had been dumped into your lap, like how to earn a living, and why people fell in and out of love, and how long could you carry on smoking and then give up without getting lung cancer. Maybe the answers weren’t important. Maybe it was the asking that mattered. Not taking anything for granted. Maybe that’s what stopped you growing old.” – 279-280

“He’d bided his time. He’d got away. He’d built a little world in which he felt safe. And it was orbiting far out, unconnected to anyone. It was cold and it was dark and he had no idea how to make it swing back towards the sun. There’d been a moment…when he realised he needed these people.” – 319

“Jamie pulled into the village and felt that slight sinking in his stomach he always felt going back. The family thing. Like he was fourteen again. He parked over the road from the house, turned off the engine and gathered himself. The secret was to remember that you were an adult now, that all of you were adults, that there was no longer any need to fight the battles you were fighting when you were fourteen…That was the problem, wasn’t it? You left home. But you never did become an adult. Not really. You just fucked up in different and more complicated ways.” – 384

Quotes

Quotes from The Line of Beauty – Alan Hollinghurst

Geoff W

“His confessed but entirely imaginary seductions took on – partly through the special effort required to invent them and repeat them consistently – the quality of real memories. He sometimes had the sense, from a hint of reserve in people he was talking to, that while they didn’t believe him they saw he was beginning to believe himself.” – 26

“He knew he was supposed to be able to tell; in fact he tended to think people were when they weren’t, and so lived with a recurrent sense of disappointment, at them and at his own inadequate sensors. He didn’t tell Catherine, but his uncertainty on the house tour had actually been the other way around. Had his own gayness somehow put Lord Kessler off and made him seem unreliable and lightweight in the old boy’s eyes? Had Lord Kessler even registered – in his clever, unimpressionable way – that Nick was gay?’ – 57

“He felt he floated forwards into another place, beautiful, speculative, even dangerous, a place created and held open by the music but separate from it. It had the mood of a troubling dream, where nothing could be known for certain or offer a solid foothold to memory after one had woken. What really was his understanding with Wani? The pursuit of love seemed to need the cultivation of indifference. The deep connection between them was so secret that at times it was hard to believe it existed. He wondered if anyone knew – had even a flicker of a guess, an intuition blinked away by its own absurdity. How could anyone tell? He felt there must always be hints of a secret affair, some involuntary tenderness or respect, a particular way of not noticing each other…He wondered if it ever would be known, or if they would take the secret to the grave. For a minute he felt unable to move, as if he were hypnotized by Wani’s image. It took a little shudder to break the charm.” – 240-241

“The photographer was at large, and his flash gleamed in the mirrors. He slipped and lingered among the guests, approached with a smile, like a vaguely remembered bore, in his bow tie and dinner jacket, and then pouf! – he’d got them. Later he came back, he came around, because most shots catch a bleary blink or a turned shoulder, and got them again. Now they bunched and faced him, or they pretended they hadn’t seen him and acted themselves with careless magnificence. Nick dropped onto the sofa beside Catherine, lounged with one leg curled under him and a grin on his face at his own elegance. He felt he could act himself all night. He felt fabulous, he loved these nights, and whilst it would have been good to top the thing off with sex, it seemed hardly to matter if he didn’t. It made the absolute best of not having sex.” – 379

Quotes

Quotes from A Midsummer Night’s Dream – William Shakespeare

Geoff W

“Love can transpose to form and dignity.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is wing’d Cupid painted blind.”

– Act I, Scene I

“What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
I pray the gentle mortal sing again.
Mine ear is much enamour’d of thy note;
So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape;
And thy fair virtue’s force, perforce, doth move me,
On the first view, to say, to swear, I love thee.”

– Act III, Scene I