Anne of Windy Poplars

by L.M. Montgomery

"It's dusk, dearest. (In passing, isn't 'dusk' a lovely word? I like it better than twilight. It sounds so velvety and shadowy and … and … dusky.) In daylight I belong to the world … in the night to sleep and eternity. But in the dusk I'm free from both and belong only to myself … and you.

"I fell in love with it at once. You know there are houses which impress themselves upon you at first sight for some reason you can hardly define.

Have you ever noticed how many different silences there are, Gilbert? The silence of the woods … of the shore … of the meadows … of the night … of the summer afternoon. All different because all the undertones that thread them are different. I'm sure if I were totally blind and insensitive to heat and cold I could easily tell just where I was by the quality of the silence about me.

"Do you know, Gilbert, there are times when I strongly suspect that I love you!"

The Woman had told her that Tomorrow never comes, but Elizabeth knows better. It will come sometime. Some beautiful morning she will just wake up and find it is Tomorrow. Not Today but Tomorrow. And then things will happen … wonderful things.

I never much wanted to be married but I think it would have been nice to be engaged.

"I think you're very, very tired, after all these weeks of preparation and strain, and that things which were always hard have become too hard all at once."

it's these eyebrows. I really think they're what scare the men away.

so many kill-joys, afraid to enjoy today because of what tomorrow will bring. "Gilbert darling, don't let's ever be afraid of things. It's such dreadful slavery. Let's be daring and adventurous and expectant. Let's dance to meet life and all it can bring to us, even if it brings scads of trouble and typhoid and twins!

"Gilbert, I'm afraid I'm scandalously in love with you. You don't think it's irreverent, do you? But then, you're not a minister."

"Dearest, aren't you glad your name is Blythe?

But this was really rather a terrible old house, full of the ghosts of dead hatreds and heart-breaks, crowded with dark deeds that had never been dragged into light and were still festering in its corners and hidy-holes.

"And when the week is ended you will be home … and I won't want anything else."