On the Verge of Tears Quotes

“When Ged comments to her that they have passed beyond the malign influence of the gods, Tenar experiences her release from the burden of relinquishing through tears, and in his company:

"She did feel it. A dark hand had let go its lifelong hold upon her heart. But she did not feel joy, as she had in the mountains. She put her head down in her arms and cried, and her cheeks were salt and wet. She cried for the waste of her years in bondage to a useless evil. She wept in pain, because she was free" (Ursula K. Le Guin, "The Tombs of Atuan").

Tenar literally cries freedom, with "the pain of memory" for an originary lack, that of freedom and of self. Her ability to cry is returned to her by Ged's knowledge of her true name, a word from a language other than his own, a thing of great value that both restores her to herself and places him in her trust.”
― Michele Byers, On the Verge of Tears: Why the Movies, Television, Music, Art, Popular Culture, Literature, and the Real World Make Us Cry