That Distant Land Quotes

“When my grandfather was dying, I was not thinking about the past. My grandfather was still a man I knew, but as he subsided day by day he was ceasing to be the man I had known. I was experiencing consciously for the first time that transformation in which the living, by dying, pass into the living, and I was full of grief and love and wonder.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“One morning toward the beginning of that time, while he still remained in charge of his life, though we could see that his departure had begun,”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“Wheeler served them as their defender against the law itself, before which they were ciphers, and so felt themselves—and he could do this only as their friend.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“I had heard it all before—most of us had—but John T. had never heard any of it, because he usually didn’t listen to anybody but himself. He was shocked. For almost a full minute, Sam having spoken to his satisfaction and John T. unable to speak at all, they just looked at each other.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“The trouble came from the boys, or, more exactly, from the boys between the ages of about five and about eleven, who did not come with any plans or expectations, and who therefore took their entertainment as a matter of adventure, making do with whatever came to hand.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“In putting them on, he forgot about them and began, without the slightest malice toward them, to subject them to various forms of abuse.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“The only time Tol’s clothes looked good was before he put them on.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“A hood is far from an ideal garment to wear in a fistfight.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories

“Whereas his father only ruled him, Aunt Molly owned him outright, at least when he was in the house where she could get at him.”
― Wendell Berry, That Distant Land: The Collected Stories