Gerald > Gerald's Quotes

“Life, too, is like that. You live it forward, but understand it backward." from CUTTING FOR STONE”
― Abraham Verghese

“When the conventional wisdom of physics seemed to conflict with an elegant theory of his, Einstein was inclined to question that wisdom rather than his theory, often to have his stubbornness rewarded.”
― Walter Isaacson

“I'm ashamed of our human capacity to hurt and maim one another, to desecrate the body. Yet it allows me to see the cabalistic harmony of heart peeking out behind lung, of liver and spleen consulting each other under the dome of the diaphragm -- these things leave me speechless.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“Yesterday misspent can't be recall'd
Vanity makes beauty contemptible
Wisdom is more valuable than riches.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“It is better to remain silent at the risk of being thought a fool, than to talk and remove all doubt of it.”
― Maurice Switzer, Mrs. Goose, Her Book

“I spent as much time as I could with Ghosh. I wanted every bit of wisdom he could impart to me. All sons should write down every word of what their fathers have to say to them. I tried. Why did it take an illness for me to recognize the value of time with him? It seems we humans never learn. And so we relearn the lesson every generation and then want to write epistles. We proselytize to our friends and shake them by the shoulders and tell them, "Seize the day! What matters is THIS moment!" Most of us can't go back and make restitution. We can't do a thing about our should haves and our could haves. But a few lucky men like Ghosh never have such worries; there was no restitution he needed to make, no moment he failed to seize.

Now and then Ghosh would grin and wink at me across the room. He was teaching me how to die, just as he'd taught me how to live.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“That's the funny thing about America--the blessed thing. As many people as there are to hold you back, there are angels whose humanity makes up for all the others. I've had my share of angels.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“A rich man's faults are covered with money, but a surgeon's faults are covered with earth.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“But for all its miseries, there was an unmistakable allure to the jockey's craft... Man is preoccupied with freedom yet laden with handicaps. The breadth of his activity and experience is narrowed by the limitations of his relative weak, sluggish body. The racehorse, by virtue of his awesome physical gifts, freed the jockey from himself. When a horse and a jockey flew over the tack together, there were moments in which the man's mind wedded itself to the animal's body to form something greater than the sum of both parts. The horse partook of the jockey's cunning; the jockey partook of the horse's supreme power. For the jockey, the saddle was a place of unparalled exhilaration, of transcendence.”
― Laura Hillenbrand

“The crookedness of the serpent is still straight enough to slide through the snake hole.”
― Abraham Verghese, Cutting for Stone

“When Grandma Mazur is talking about the reason for the improved play of her 91-year-old bowling teammate, she said:
"She's doing better now that we got her the longer tubing to her oxygen tank.”
― Janet Evanovich, Explosive Eighteen

“Connie, giving her thoughts on why Vinnie's hot temper is less than normal, says: "Lucille must have fed him a Vallium smoothie this morning.”
― Janet Evanovich, Explosive Eighteen

“As Stephanie and Lula were going after the bad guys, Lula was making preparations from the trunk of her Firebird. Stephanie looked inside and stopped breathing for a beat. "That's a rocket launcher!" "Yep," Lula said. "It's a big boy. I got it at a yard sale in the projects.”
― Janet Evanovich, Explosive Eighteen