"How can you ever know what the right thing is? How can you ever know?" she says.
"You can't. I keep wondering too. Whether I've made an awful mistake....." p.34
Brian, her elder son, was lost at Trondheim, in the Norwegian campaign. After it happened, I would panic sometimes when I was with her, afraid of the gaps in conversations, as though they were cliffs you could fall from-afraid of saying his name. Once I told her, I'm so frightened of reminding you, I don't want to make you upset....And she said, Vivienne, it's not as though you're reminding me of something I've forgotten. It's not as though I don't think of him every moment of every day. The only time I don't think of him is when I'm fast asleep-then every morning I wake up and I have to learn it again. p. 35
"Which is the best book here?" he says.
I smile.
"That's an impossible question," I say. p.154
but then of course life intervened, as it has a habit of doing. p.157
" Getting old is strange," I say. It isn't at all how you think it's going to be." ....."Yet sometimes I feel as if I'm still waiting for my life to begin." I'm speaking slowly working out exactly what I mean......."....But life doesn't wait - it trickles between your fingers, trickles away....."
"Sometimes I feel as though the real things are passing me by. As though I've been pushed to the margins of life...."p.158
And I think just for a moment that yes, that was sad, and how could you live, not knowing when the one you loved would leave you. And then thinking that it's always like that. p.184
"But life doesn't always give you what you want," he says. His eyes on me. "Well most of the time it doesn't." p. 186
"Maybe it's my fault. maybe I've read her too many stories.'
He smiles - that smile I love, that fills his eyes with light.
"A child cannot be read too many stories," he says. "That is impossible." p.258
Monday, March 26, 2012
Friday, January 20, 2012
The Lotus Eaters by Tatjana Soli
Years later Linh would wish that there had been some sign that this moment was the perfect one, balanced on the edge of changing, that the three of them would never again be together and as happy as they were then. But even if he had known, how did one hold time? p. 201
"Remember asking why the people supposed to love us the most are the ones who try to stop us doing what we love?" p. 210
Only the last line spoke to her so she could hear his voice: Each night I pray life is coming back to you, a piece at a time, just as on the burned hills the grass reappears. She studied the photo more closely. The day on the beach at Vung Tau. Linh staring not at the camera but at her. Of course. She had known but ignored what she knew. The war wouldn't be over for her until she saw that grass reappear on those scarred hills.
This is what happened when one left one's home - pieces of oneself scattered all over the world, no one place ever completely satisfied, always a nostalgia for the place left behind. p. 277
"I survived." She forced herself to be nonchalant, not able to stand his pity.
"It should have been me."
"Much easier to be hurt rather than be the one watching it." p.301
The body, he knew, has a memory all its own. the shape of a baby in one's arms will be imprinted forever, the cup of a lover's chin. p.306
One came to love another through repeated touch, he believed, the way a mother bonded with her newborn, the way his family had slept in the communal room, brushing against one another, a patterning through nerve endings, a laying of pulse against pulse, creating a rhythm of blood, and so now he touched, strangers, only fleetingly,without hope. p.326
His anguish had grown skeletal in its solitude. He wished it didn't have be so, that one could ingest pain and keep it from others, but instead it seemed one could only lessen it by inflicting little cuts and bruises of it on another. p. 335
"Remember asking why the people supposed to love us the most are the ones who try to stop us doing what we love?" p. 210
Only the last line spoke to her so she could hear his voice: Each night I pray life is coming back to you, a piece at a time, just as on the burned hills the grass reappears. She studied the photo more closely. The day on the beach at Vung Tau. Linh staring not at the camera but at her. Of course. She had known but ignored what she knew. The war wouldn't be over for her until she saw that grass reappear on those scarred hills.
This is what happened when one left one's home - pieces of oneself scattered all over the world, no one place ever completely satisfied, always a nostalgia for the place left behind. p. 277
"I survived." She forced herself to be nonchalant, not able to stand his pity.
"It should have been me."
"Much easier to be hurt rather than be the one watching it." p.301
The body, he knew, has a memory all its own. the shape of a baby in one's arms will be imprinted forever, the cup of a lover's chin. p.306
One came to love another through repeated touch, he believed, the way a mother bonded with her newborn, the way his family had slept in the communal room, brushing against one another, a patterning through nerve endings, a laying of pulse against pulse, creating a rhythm of blood, and so now he touched, strangers, only fleetingly,without hope. p.326
His anguish had grown skeletal in its solitude. He wished it didn't have be so, that one could ingest pain and keep it from others, but instead it seemed one could only lessen it by inflicting little cuts and bruises of it on another. p. 335
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Pictures of Hollis Woods by Patricia Reilly Giff
"Do it on my drawing," I said.
"Never," she told me. It's your world, it belongs to you."..... "Drawing is what you see of the world, truly see."....
"And sometimes what you see is so deep in your head you're not even sure of what you're seeing. But when it's down there on paper, and you look at it, really look, you'll see the way things are."
I frowned. "Look at a picture one way and you'll see one thing," I said. "Look again and you might see something else. That's what the Old Man..." I shook my head. "A friend of mine said that once."
...."But that's the world isn't it? You have to keep looking to find the truth."
"And something else," she said. "You, the artist, can't hide from the world, because you're putting yourself down there too."
".... your soul is right there in front of you." She pointed to the sketch I'd drawn... (p.45)
"You're going to be something, you and that language you speak on paper." She drew her other hand waving. "I love what you have to say, Hollis Woods." (p.46)
In my mind was a picture of Beatrice brushing her hair off her forehead. "Drawing is a language," she had said. "You have to learn to speak it." (p. 148)
"Sometimes we learn from our own drawings; things are there that we thought we didn't know." (p.150)
"Never," she told me. It's your world, it belongs to you."..... "Drawing is what you see of the world, truly see."....
"And sometimes what you see is so deep in your head you're not even sure of what you're seeing. But when it's down there on paper, and you look at it, really look, you'll see the way things are."
I frowned. "Look at a picture one way and you'll see one thing," I said. "Look again and you might see something else. That's what the Old Man..." I shook my head. "A friend of mine said that once."
...."But that's the world isn't it? You have to keep looking to find the truth."
"And something else," she said. "You, the artist, can't hide from the world, because you're putting yourself down there too."
".... your soul is right there in front of you." She pointed to the sketch I'd drawn... (p.45)
"You're going to be something, you and that language you speak on paper." She drew her other hand waving. "I love what you have to say, Hollis Woods." (p.46)
In my mind was a picture of Beatrice brushing her hair off her forehead. "Drawing is a language," she had said. "You have to learn to speak it." (p. 148)
"Sometimes we learn from our own drawings; things are there that we thought we didn't know." (p.150)
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Great House by Nicole Krauss
There is beautiful prose in this book, but I did not enjoy reading it. Check out my review on Goodreads.com. My picks:
When I was with Yoav, everything in me that had been sitting stood up. He had a way of looking at me with a kind of unabashed directness that made me shiver. It's something amazing to feel that for the first time someone is seeing you as you really are, not as they wish you, or you wish yourself, to be. (p. 134)
Look at him, she used to say to me, a man like any other, coming home laden with groceries. And yet, in his soul all the dreams, the sadness and joy, love and regret, all the bitter loss of the people he passes on the street fight for a place in his words. (p. 145)
No, what I'm speaking of now, or trying to speak of, is something else, the sense that her self-sufficiency - the proof she carried within her that she could withstand unthinkable tragedy on her own, that in fact the extreme solitude she had constructed around herself, reducing herself, folding in on herself, turning a silent scream into the weight of private work, was precisely what enabled her to withstand it - made it impossible for her to ever need me as I needed her. (p.256)
The dead take their secrets with them, or so they say. But it isn't really true, is it? The secrets of the dead have a viral quality, and find a way to keep themselves alive in another host. No, I was guilty of nothing more than advancing the inevitable. (p. 258)
When I was with Yoav, everything in me that had been sitting stood up. He had a way of looking at me with a kind of unabashed directness that made me shiver. It's something amazing to feel that for the first time someone is seeing you as you really are, not as they wish you, or you wish yourself, to be. (p. 134)
Look at him, she used to say to me, a man like any other, coming home laden with groceries. And yet, in his soul all the dreams, the sadness and joy, love and regret, all the bitter loss of the people he passes on the street fight for a place in his words. (p. 145)
No, what I'm speaking of now, or trying to speak of, is something else, the sense that her self-sufficiency - the proof she carried within her that she could withstand unthinkable tragedy on her own, that in fact the extreme solitude she had constructed around herself, reducing herself, folding in on herself, turning a silent scream into the weight of private work, was precisely what enabled her to withstand it - made it impossible for her to ever need me as I needed her. (p.256)
The dead take their secrets with them, or so they say. But it isn't really true, is it? The secrets of the dead have a viral quality, and find a way to keep themselves alive in another host. No, I was guilty of nothing more than advancing the inevitable. (p. 258)
Monday, October 24, 2011
The Alchemyst: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel by Michael Scott
It's funny how I read this at the same time I was reading These is my Words by Nancy E. Turner and the one quote that stood out to me is similar to one in Turner's book. The quote:
"And once begun, change cannot be reversed."
Maybe it has to do with my own feelings about and resistance to change.
"And once begun, change cannot be reversed."
Maybe it has to do with my own feelings about and resistance to change.
These is my Words by Nancy E. Turner
This is a beautifully written book. The many, and I know it's a lot, samples I selected here all spoke to me, but the entire book is written with beautiful prose in a first person account that manages to allow the readers to really know the characters in the story. Turner actually captures the dialect, cadence and voice of her main character and through it reflects how her character grows and matures in life and as result of her education. Here are my favorites:
there's never any turning back in life
I watched all that and thought you just never know sometimes what's in a man's heart. When you think he is all tough nails and boards he can be different on the inside. It makes me wonder about the other men I know too.
These books are not trash, I said, as I know they are the opposite. They are the only thing I wanted in my life more than I could name. They are the pearls in my hair and scarlet velvet gowns but I could not say that out loud because they would think I was touched.
the real beauty of a person ... is their spirit and good and simple ways
...children mourn in little bits here and there like patchwork in their lives.
There is no outrunning fear,...it comes on you and you have to face it.
Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the hardest. All the people I love are down the side aways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like they have a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone.
A friendly silence can speak between two who will walk together a long way...
Education doesn't keep a person from being a fool, and the lack of it doesn't keep a person being intelligent.
We are driving away, and I look back over my shoulder with a strange feeling of parting. It is not a lonely feeling, but just as am I always sad to close the cover on a book, I feel I have finished with this part of my life and will have to begin a new book.
If tiredness could be measured in buckets I am a deep well of tiredness.
If I'm riding a horse and get thrown, it's just a matter of getting back on. And if I'm fighting for my life, there's only living and dying to choose from. But taking that test, that's like showing other people the inside of your thoughts, and just waiting for them to say wrong, wrong, wrong, and you can have thought that seems right but since you never went to school, maybe it isn't.
My life feels like a book left out on the porch, and the wind blows the pages faster and faster, turning always toward a new chapter faster than I can stop and read it.
I want them to know that I love you and just how much, too. And that I don't leave you because that feeling's not there, but I stay alive because it is.
there's never any turning back in life
I watched all that and thought you just never know sometimes what's in a man's heart. When you think he is all tough nails and boards he can be different on the inside. It makes me wonder about the other men I know too.
These books are not trash, I said, as I know they are the opposite. They are the only thing I wanted in my life more than I could name. They are the pearls in my hair and scarlet velvet gowns but I could not say that out loud because they would think I was touched.
the real beauty of a person ... is their spirit and good and simple ways
...children mourn in little bits here and there like patchwork in their lives.
There is no outrunning fear,...it comes on you and you have to face it.
Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the hardest. All the people I love are down the side aways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like they have a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone.
A friendly silence can speak between two who will walk together a long way...
Education doesn't keep a person from being a fool, and the lack of it doesn't keep a person being intelligent.
We are driving away, and I look back over my shoulder with a strange feeling of parting. It is not a lonely feeling, but just as am I always sad to close the cover on a book, I feel I have finished with this part of my life and will have to begin a new book.
If tiredness could be measured in buckets I am a deep well of tiredness.
If I'm riding a horse and get thrown, it's just a matter of getting back on. And if I'm fighting for my life, there's only living and dying to choose from. But taking that test, that's like showing other people the inside of your thoughts, and just waiting for them to say wrong, wrong, wrong, and you can have thought that seems right but since you never went to school, maybe it isn't.
My life feels like a book left out on the porch, and the wind blows the pages faster and faster, turning always toward a new chapter faster than I can stop and read it.
I want them to know that I love you and just how much, too. And that I don't leave you because that feeling's not there, but I stay alive because it is.
Friday, October 14, 2011
Tongue Fu! How to Deflect, Disarm, and Defuse Any Verbal Conflict by Sam Horn
I read this because I'm trying to master the art of positive talk, particularly for my students. Sam Horn uses a lot of quotes from a variety of sources, but I think this one might be hers:
"Commit to using more positive images and you can climb out of those self-made dungeons and see the world as the wonder it is."
Although I don't think this next one is an original thought, because I have seen it on posters, I do think it's worth repeating.
"The word listen contains the same letters as the word silent for good reason."
"Commit to using more positive images and you can climb out of those self-made dungeons and see the world as the wonder it is."
Although I don't think this next one is an original thought, because I have seen it on posters, I do think it's worth repeating.
"The word listen contains the same letters as the word silent for good reason."
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