Funeral Quotes

“I did not attend his funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.”
― Mark Twain

“I want words at my funeral. But I guess that means you need life in your life.”
― Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

“How could you go about choosing something that would hold the half of your heart you had to bury?”
― Jodi Picoult, Mercy

“That afternoon my mother had brought me the roses.
"Save them for my funeral," I'd said.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

“I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading – treading – till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through –

And when they all were seated,
A Service, like a Drum –
Kept beating – beating – till I thought
My Mind was going numb –

And then I heard them lift a Box
And creak across my Soul
With those same Boots of Lead, again,
Then Space – began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a Bell,
And Being, but an Ear,
And I, and Silence, some strange Race
Wrecked, solitary, here –

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,
And I dropped down, and down –
And hit a World, at every plunge,
And Finished knowing – then –”
― Emily Dickinson, The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson

“For 3 million you could give everyone in Scotland a shovel, and we could dig a hole so deep we could hand her over to Satan in person. (on Margaret Thatcher)”
― Frankie Boyle

“Mist to mist, drops to drops. For water thou art, and unto water shalt thou return.”
― Kamand Kojouri

“Your coffin reached the monstrous hole. And a part of me went down into the muddy earth with you and lay down next to you and died with you.”
― Rosamund Lupton, Sister

“Be aware of this truth that the people on this earth could be joyous, if only they would live rationally and if they would contribute mutually to each others' welfare.

This world is not a vale of sorrows if you will recognize discriminatingly what is truly excellent in it; and if you will avail yourself of it for mutual happiness and well-being. Therefore, let us explain as often as possible, and particularly at the departure of life, that we base our faith on firm foundations, on Truth for putting into action our ideas which do not depend on fables and ideas which Science has long ago proven to be false.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Palm Sunday: An Autobiographical Collage

“Most of the funeral stuff is going to be done during daylight hours,” I said.
“I’m not even going to be able to attend the burial.
Humans get upset when vampires burst into flames right next to them.”
― Molly Harper, Nice Girls Don't Date Dead Men

“Graham Chapman, co-author of the "Parrot Sketch", is no more. He has ceased to be. Bereft of life, he rests in peace. He's kicked the bucket, hopped the twig, bit the dust, snuffed it, breathed his last, and gone to meet the great Head of Light Entertainment in the sky. And I guess that we're all thinking how sad it is that a man of such talent, of such capability for kindness, of such unusual intelligence, should now so suddenly be spirited away at the age of only forty-eight, before he'd achieved many of the things of which he was capable, and before he'd had enough fun. Well, I feel that I should say: nonsense. Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard, I hope he fries. And the reason I feel I should say this is he would never forgive me if I didn't, if I threw away this glorious opportunity to shock you all on his behalf. Anything for him but mindless good taste.
(He paused, then claimed that Chapman had whipered in his ear while he was writing the speech):
All right, Cleese. You say you're very proud of being the very first person ever to say 'shit' on British television. If this service is really for me, just for starters, I want you to become the first person ever at a British memorial service to say 'fuck'.”
― John Cleese

“Never did tombs look so ghastly white. Never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom. Never did tree or grass wave or rustle so ominously. Never did bough creak so mysteriously, and never did the far-away howling of dogs send such a woeful presage through the night.”
― Bram Stoker, Dracula

“A premature death does not only rob one of the countless instances where one would have experienced pleasure, it also saves one from the innumerable instances where one would have experienced pain.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“The point is that no matter what you choose to do with your body when you die, it won't, ultimately, be very appealing. If you are inclined to donate yourself to science, you should not let images of dissection or dismemberment put you off. They are no more or less gruesome, in my opinion, than ordinary decay or the sewing shut of your jaws via your nostrils for a funeral viewing.”
― Mary Roach, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

“I'm telling you, Augustus Waters talked so much that he'd interrupt you at his own funeral.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

“Here's the other thing I think about. It makes little sense to try to control what happens to your remains when you are no longer around to reap the joys or benefits of that control. People who make elaborate requests concerning disposition of their bodies are probably people who have trouble with the concept of not existing. [...] I imagine it is a symptom of the fear, the dread, of being gone, of the refusal to accept that you no longer control, or even participate in, anything that happens on earth. I spoke about this with funeral director Kevin McCabe, who believes that decisions concerning the disposition of a body should be mad by the survivors, not the dead. "It's non of their business what happens to them whey the die," he said to me. While I wouldn't go that far, I do understand what he was getting at: that the survivors shouldn't have to do something they're uncomfortable with or ethically opposed to. Mourning and moving on are hard enough. Why add to the burden? If someone wants to arrange a balloon launch of the deceased's ashes into inner space, that's fine. But if it is burdensome or troubling for any reason, then perhaps they shouldn't have to.”
― Mary Roach, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

“The more death, the more birth. People are entering, others are exiting. The cry of a baby, the mourning of others. When others cry, the other are laughing and making merry. The world is mingled with sadness, joy, happiness, anger, wealth, poverty, etc.”
― Michael Bassey Johnson

“It's important to attend funerals. It is important to view the body, they say, and to see it committed to earth or fire because unless you do that, the loved one dies for you again and again.”
― Ann-Marie MacDonald, Fall on Your Knees

“O Earth, lie heavily upon her eyes;
Seal her sweet eyes weary of watching Earth;
Lie close around her; leave no room for mirth
With its harsh laughter, nor for sound of sighs.
She hath no questions, she hath no replies.”
― Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides

“Western funerals: black hearses, and black horses, and fast-fading flowers. Why should black be the colour of death? Why not the colours of a sunset?”
― Daniele Varè, The Maker of Heavenly Trousers

“If I were to believe in God enough to call him a murderer, then I might also believe enough that he, as a spirit, exists beyond death; and therefore only he could do it righteously. For the physical being kills a man and hatefully sends him away, whereas God, the spiritual being, kills a man and lovingly draws him nigh.”
― Criss Jami, Healology

“I remembered back to leo's burial and holding your hand. I was eleven and you were six, your hand soft and small in mine. As the vicar said 'in sure and certain hope of the resurrection of eternal life' you turned to me, 'I don't want sure and certain hope I want sure and certain Bee.”
― Rosamund Lupton, Sister

“Oh, Caddy," said Saffron miserably.
"I know. It's awful. But I'm going. We all should."
"It will be so sad."
"You have to be sad sometimes," said Caddy. "Whatever Dad says. He may be right. Granddad probably had totally lost his marbles, but I am still sad and I'm still going to the funeral. I shall be as unhappy as I like and I shall where black.”
― Hilary McKay, Saffy's Angel

“It's a sad thing to see, because as far as I know, this man Gavo had done nothing to deserve being shot in the back of the head at his own funeral. Twice.”
― Téa Obreht, The Tiger's Wife

“I never saw a dollar bill cry at anyone's funeral.”
― J. Lincoln Fenn

“Attending a funeral would leave the average person insane, if they truly believed that sooner or later they are also going to die.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“Death was final and absolute and there was nothing anyone could do to change it.”
― C.J. Tudor, The Chalk Man

“In the emptiness that was all around me, I noticed an old tennis ball in the plantings; I picked it up and dropped it at Zoë’s feet. I didn’t know what I was doing, if I had a specific intention. Was I trying to lighten the mood? I don’t know, but I felt I had to do something. So there the ball bounced to a stop at her bare feet.
She looked down at the ball but did nothing with it.
Maxwell noticed what I had done, and he noticed Zoë’s lack of reaction. He picked up the ball and, with a mighty heave, threw it so far into the woods behind the house that I lost sight of it and could only barely hear it crash through the leaves of bushes on its way back to earth. It was quite an impressive toss, the pale tennis ball sailing through the air against the clear blue sky. What amount of psychic pain was expended on that ball, I had no idea.”
― Garth Stein, The Art of Racing in the Rain

“What a waste.. All those people saying all those wonderful things, and Irv never got to hear any of it.”
― Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie

“Unlike tires, life has no spare.”
― Martin Uzochukwu Ugwu