Thimble Quotes

“Helpless, heartbroken and lonely, Katrien sank into the grass at the side of the road and wept—wept until she had no more tears. Darkness had already set in by the time she picked up the overturned basket and headed home. From somewhere in the grass came the gleam of a silver thimble…”
― Anne Frank, Anne Frank's Tales from the Secret Annex: A Collection of Her Short Stories, Fables, and Lesser-Known Writings

“He moved an inch toward her. “You’re the loveliest woman ever to bash her head against a wall, but the wall you’re battering is and thicker than the Great Wall of China, and there’s only one of you. It’s not the stones that will give way to you, my dear.”
Free swallowed. “You’ve got it wrong.”
“Ah, the wall is made of paper, then, and you’ll burst through it at any second.” He laughed at her, and she could hear that ice in his voice. “Give yourself another ten years, and maybe you’ll understand what you’re facing. Until then, go ahead. Keep fighting.”
Free contemplated him in the darkness. “After tonight, do you still think that I’m naïve? That I don’t understand how the world works?”
“There’s no proof you do understand it. After everything you saw today, you still stayed up to send out your next issue. What do you imagine your little paper will change? Do you think that suddenly, Delacey will read one of your essays and say, ‘Good God, I’ve got it all wrong. Women deserve to be treated fairly after all’?”
“No,” Free looked away. “Of course I don’t think that. I’ll never convince him.”
“Or do you imagine that there is a group of men somewhere who haven’t yet made up their minds on the question of female suffrage? Men who are thinking, ‘Well, I suppose women might be actual human, just like men. Maybe I had better look out for them.’”
Free felt her face flush. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Because I can tell you what will happen,” Mr. Clark said in his dark, dangerous voice. “You women will squawk amongst yourselves about injustice and fairness. Maybe if you do it loudly enough, someday a handful of you will be allowed to vote, and it will be accounted a great victory. Maybe in fifty years, women will achieve a distinct minority in the professional classes. We might have a woman doctor, a woman barrister, and then five or ten of you might form an organization together and shake hands because something has been accomplished.”
Free let out a breath.
“Maybe in a hundred years of women voting, you might manage a single female Prime Minister.” He gave her a rough smile. “But just the one, and even so, people will never take her seriously. If she’s stern, they’ll blame her menstrual cycle. If she smiles, it will be proof that women are not strong enough to lead. That’s what you’re setting yourself up for, Miss Marshall. A lifetime of small wins, of victories that land like lead in your stomach. Your cause may be just. But you’re delusional if you think you can accomplish anything. You’re pitting yourself against an institution that is older than our country, Miss Marshall. It’s so old that we rarely even need speak of it. Rage all you want, Miss Marshall, but you’ll have more success emptying the Thames with a thimble.”
He touched a finger to his forehead in mock salute, as if tipping a hat. As if she’d just departed the land of reality, and he’d wished her a pleasant journey. His words didn’t match his actions, though. He came even closer to her as he spoke, leaning in with every sentence, until he seemed almost on the verge of kissing her.”
― Courtney Milan, The Suffragette Scandal