It's a bird...it's a plane...no, it's...A QUOTE!

[Lynne]

Better leave a quote here faster than a speeding bullet!

[Susan]

From Cuba: My Revolution:

A strange silence settles over the front when we arrive at Playa Larga. Masses of vultures appear from nowhere -- circling, swooping, circling.

Fire shoots through my limbs, and there's a pain in my chest, so deep that I think I'll crack. I can see a line running down my torso, splitting me in two, and I squeeze my chest, trying to hold it together.

[Susan]

From A Contract with God, considered the first true graphic novel:

author's prologue:
With hindsight, I realize I was really only working around one core concept -- that the medium, the arrangement of words and pictures in a sequence -- was an art form in itself. Unique, with a structure and gestalt all its own, this medium could deal with meaningful themes.

pp. 46-48:
One evening Frimme Hersh walked from his penthouse uptown all the way to the old synagogue.
There he called on the wisest of the elders.
"Do you remember me? ... I'm Frimme Hersh."
"We remember you." ...
"Now I need something from you!"
"From us? ... What can we give a wealthy man?"
"You can write for me a new contract between me and God!!"

[Susan]

Quotes don't do much for most graphic novels. So I've been pretty much skipping them. But I can maybe give a little taste of Halo: Fall of Reach - Bootcamp:

"That's the Mark I armor ..."
"Yes, Ma'am. These suits used to be used for dock work, heavy lifting and the like ..."
But ever since the spartans recovered from their procedures, the trainers have been using those suits for protection."

[Lynne]

Susan wrote: "From A Contract with God, considered the first true graphic novel:

author's prologue:
With hindsight, I realize I was really only working around one core concept -- that the medium, ..."

Sounds interesting.

[Dionisia]

Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles: The Authorized Adaptation

From page 81...

They carried odorous paper bags into which from time to time upon the long walk they would insert their noses to inhale the rich smell of the ham and mayonnaised pickles, and to listen to the gurgle of the orange soda in the warming bottles. They would dare each other on past the limits set by their stern mothers.

[Susan]

from Fun Home:

I was away at school that summer, generating bar codes for all the books in the college library.
"I have to go home. My father got hit by a truck."
"Oh my God. Is he ok?"
"Umm ..."
I bicycled back to my apartment marveling at the dissonance between this apparently carefree activity and my newly tragic circumstances.
As I told my girlfriend what had happened, I cried quite genuinely for about two minutes.
That was all.

[Susan]

Yossel is that rare graphic novel with enough text to actually quote some:

Those inmates who passed before my eyes were no longer people. No longer human. Numbers. Tattooed animals. Some bore a vague resemblance to those I had known. Had they lived in my village? Was that one a neighbor ... a friend? No. They were only grey, slow moving ghosts. Dead people, not realizing that they were dead.

I swore I would not become one of them.

[Susan]

from Grandville:

"No, we've no idea who he is, other than a bloody nuisance."
"All we know is that he's a huge English badger. Wears a bowler and greatcoat and has a rat accomplice. That's it."
"He killed two more agents today - in a Turkish baths of all places. He has to be eliminated. We can't risk him interfering with our plans."

[LynnB]

Beowulf - Graphic Novel by Gareth Hinds

"Certain men are newly come, my lord, far across the sea from the land of the Geats, and the name of their chief is Beowulf. They make petition that they may speak with thee, and I would counsel that thou refuse not their request, for their gear is that of worthy men and their chief is a noble prince."

[Susan]

from The Rabbi's Cat

(the cat's thoughts):
This guy kicks me when the rabbi has his back turned.
I don't really like young men. Especially when they're passionate about religion.
They wield it as an instrument of power.
Scholarship allows them to speak at the table.
To get women's attention, to crush their rivals, to interrupt their father.
Such animals.

[Susan]

from Pearls Before Swine:
Rat: "We always look back on ancient times and wonder how they lived without today's conveniences, like TVs, phones, computers.
"...And yet, some day, someone's gonna look back at us and wonder the same thing."
Pig: "Yeah, but they'd be pretty stupid, 'cause we've got all that stuff."