jas •ﻌ• > jas •ﻌ•'s Quotes

“Still, something did not seem right, and Robin could tell from Victoire’s and Ramy’s faces that they thought so too. It took him a moment to realize what it was that grated on him, and when he did, it would bother him constantly, now and thereafter; it would seem a great paradox, the fact that after everything they had told Letty, all the pain they had shared, she was the one who needed comfort.”
― R.F. Kuang, Babel

“You humans always think you’re destined for things, for tragedy or for greatness. Destiny is a myth. Destiny is the only myth. The gods choose nothing. You chose.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Poppy War

“I suppose we decided to be girls because being boys seems to require giving up half your brain cells.”
― R.F. Kuang, Babel

“Why, he wondered, did white people get so very upset when anyone disagreed with them?”
― R.F. Kuang, Babel

“We are foreign because this nation has marked us so, and as long as we’re punished daily for our ties to our homelands, we might as well defend them. No, Letty, we can’t maintain this fantasy. The only one who can do that is you.”
― R.F. Kuang, Babel

“Fire and water looked so lovely together. It was a pity they destroyed each other by nature.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Dragon Republic

“She’s the only divine thing he’s ever believed in. The only creature in this vast, cruel land who could kill him. And sometimes, in his loveliest dreams, he imagines she does.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Drowning Faith

“People will seek to use you or destroy you. If you want to live, you must pick a side. So do not shirk from war, child. Do not flinch from suffering. When you hear screaming, run toward it.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Dragon Republic

“You don't fix hurts by pretending they never happened. You treat them like infected wounds. You dig deep with a burning knife and gouge out the rotten flesh and then, maybe, you have a chance to heal.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Burning God

“Reading lets us live in someone else’s shoes. Literature builds bridges; it makes our world larger, not smaller.”
― R.F. Kuang, Yellowface

“In all of his worst nightmares, she’s dying. She’s fading away in his arms, helpless and whimpering, while hot, dark blood spills over his fingers.
This, he tells her.
He doesn’t tell her that his hand holds the blade.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Drowning Faith

“He loves her.
Of this he’s certain.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Drowning Faith

“She was a goddess. She was a monster. She‘d nearly destroyed this country. And then she‘d given it one last, gasping chance to live.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Burning God

“It doesn’t go away. It never will. But when it hurts, lean into it. It’s so much harder to stay alive. That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to live. It means you’re brave.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Burning God

“She remembered the first time she'd ever laid eyes on Nezha, and then all the times thereafter. It hurt to see him. It hurt so much.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Burning God

“Let them think of us as dirt, Rin thought. She was dirt. Her army was dirt. But dirt was common, ubiquitous, and patient, and necessary. The soil gave life to the country. And the earth always reclaimed what it was owed.”
― R.F. Kuang, The Burning God

“So long as I have questions to which there are no answers, I shall go on writing.”
― Clarice Lispector, The Hour of the Star

“Things were somehow so good that they were in danger of becoming very bad because what is fully mature is very close to rotting”
― Clarice Lispector, A Hora da Estrela

“She believed in angels, and, because she believed, they existed”
― Clarice Lispector, The Hour of the Star

“But don't forget, in the meantime, that this is the season for strawberries. Yes.”
― Clarice Lispector, The Hour of the Star