Ada

“Oh, darling, you will be good to me, won’t you? Because we’re going to have a strange life.”
― Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms

“How can I make a stranger see her as she stopped in the hall at the foot of the stairs and turned to us? I have never been able to describe even my fictitious characters except by their actions. It has always seemed to me that in a novel the reader should be allowed to imagine a character in any way he chooses: I do not want to supply him with ready-made illustrations. Now I am betrayed by my own technique, for I do not want any other woman substituted for Sarah, I want the reader to see the one broad forehead and bold mouth, the conformation of the skull, but all I can convey is an indeterminate figure turning in the dripping mackintosh, saying, 'Yes, Henry?' and then 'You?”
― Graham Greene, The End of the Affair

“You take a different view of your actions when you come to understand, when you are made to understand every day that your existence is necessary - you see, absolutely necessary - to another person.”
― Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim

“Ty mnie zabiłeś! - ty mnie nauczyłeś czytać!
W pięknych księgach i pięknym przyrodzeniu czytać!
Ty dla mnie ziemię piekłem zrobiłeś
(z żalem i uśmiechem)
i rajem!
(mocniej i ze wzgardą)
A to jest tylko ziemia!”
― Adam Mickiewicz, Dziady