Raynie > Raynie's Quotes

“But this I know; the writer who possesses the creative gift owns something of which he is not always master--something that at times strangely wills and works for itself. He may lay down rules and devise principles, and to rules and principles it will perhaps for years lie in subjection; and then, haply without any warning of revolt, there comes a time when it will no longer consent.”
― Charlotte Brontë

“It's so curious: one can resist tears and 'behave' very well in the hardest hours of grief. But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer... and everything collapses. ”
― Colette

“Funny how you dig yourself into a hole by the teaspoon—the smallest of compromises, the little roundings off or slight recastings of one emotion as another that is a tad nicer or more flattering.”
― Lionel Shriver, We Need to Talk About Kevin

“Smiles and tears are so alike with me, they are neither of them confined to any particular feelings: I often cry when I am happy, and smile when I am sad.”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“If we can only speak to slander our betters, let us hold our tongues.”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“What can’t be cured must be endured,” said I,”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“I am not alone, you see;—and those whose time is fully occupied seldom complain of solitude.”
― Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“There is a beauty in the world, though it's harsher than we expect it to be.”
― Michael Cunningham, The Hours

“But there are still the hours, aren't there? One and then another, and you get through that one and then, my god, there's another.”
― Michael Cunningham, The Hours

“Dead, we are revealed in our true dimensions, and they are surprisingly modest.”
― Michael Cunningham, The Hours

“That is what we do. That is what people do. They stay alive for each other.”
― Michael Cunningham, The Hours

“In the end, it wasn't death that surprised her but the stubbornness of life.”
― Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides

“We couldn't imagine the emptiness of a creature who put a razor to her wrists and opened her veins, the emptiness and the calm.”
― Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides

“I don’t know what you’re feeling. I won’t even pretend.”
― Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides

“You never get over it, but you get to where it doesn't bother you so much.”
― Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides

“The past is just something that's over.”
― Christopher Isherwood, A Single Man

“What it sees there isn't so much a face as the expression of a predicament.”
― Christopher Isherwood, A Single Man

“He tried to name which of the deadly seven might apply, and when he failed he decided to append an eighth, regret.”
― Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain

“I know I don't need him, but I think I want him.”
― Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain

“Verbs. All of them tiring.”
― Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain

“What was it to love someone, what was love exactly, and why did it end or not end? Those were the real questions, and who could answer them?”
― Patricia Highsmith, The Price of Salt

“It always gets late with you. - Is that a compliment?”
― Patricia Highsmith, The Price of Salt

“She thought of people she had seen holding hands in movies, and why shouldn't she and Carol?”
― Patricia Highsmith, The Price of Salt

“Marrying a woman for her beauty makes no more sense than eating a bird for its singing. But it’s a common mistake nonetheless.”
― Charles Frazier, Cold Mountain

“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.”
― Christopher Isherwood, A Single Man

“To be called beautiful was a novelty in his experience.”
― L. Frank Baum, Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz

“I read in a book once that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, but I've never been able to believe it. I don't believe a rose WOULD be as nice if it was called a thistle or a skunk cabbage.”
― L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

“There was never anything to fear. Which is a little disappointing, frankly. Maybe I wanted to be obliterated.”
― Mona Awad, Rouge

“Everyone I know has someone they love best. I'm no ones best.”
― Meg Howrey, They're Going to Love You

“Good person, bad person. Success, failure. Outside, inside. These are danceable truths. To be flesh of his flesh, blood of his blood. That’s danceable too. But the work of my life has been to ask undanceable questions and find a way to make ballets out of them. There’s nothing to do with this dance but be still.”
― Meg Howrey, They're Going to Love You