*Jam *

“He wanted Jo for his heroine, and called upon his memory to supply him with tender recollections and romantic visions of his love. But memory turned traitor, and as if possessed by the perverse spirit of the girl, would only recall Jo's oddities, faults, and freaks, would only show her in the most unsentimental aspects – beating mats
with her head tied up in a bandana, barricading herself with the sofa pillow, or throwing cold water over his passion a la Gummidge – and an irresistable laugh spoiled the pensive picture he was endeavoring to paint. Jo wouldn't be put into the opera at any price, and he had to give her up with a 'Bless that girl, what a torment she is!' (...)”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“Little they cared what anybody thought, for they were enjoying the happy hour that seldom comes but once in any life, the magical moment which bestows youth on the old, beauty on the plain, wealth on the poor, and gives human hearts a foretaste of heaven. The Professor looked as if he had conquered a kingdom, and the world had nothing more to offer him in the way of bliss. While Jo trudged beside him, feeling as if her place had always been there, and
wondering how she ever could have chosen any other lot.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“(...) nothing contributes so much to tranquillize the mind as a steady purpose - a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.”
― Mary Shelley, Frankenstein: The 1818 Text

“There is no greater sorrow
Than to be mindful of the happy time In misery”
― Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno - Purgatorio - Paradiso