The Birds And Other Stories Quotes
"On December the third the wind changed overnight and it was winter."
"Nat Hocken, because of a wartime disability, had a pension and did not work full-time at the farm."
"The earth was rich where the plow had turned it."
"Restlessness drove them to the skies again."
"They knew where they were bound, the rhythm and ritual of their life brooked no delay."
"The restless urge of autumn, unsatisfying, sad, had put a spell upon them."
"He woke just after two and heard the wind in the chimney."
"He listened, and the tapping continued until, irritated by the sound, Nat got out of bed and went to the window."
"Something was happening, because of the east wind and the weather, that he did not understand."
"The sight of the kitchen reassured him."
"The best hours of my life were spent, when I was young, upon the mountains."
"Mountains are very demanding. You have to give everything."
"The urge to climb will never be explained."
"In the mountains we come closest to whatever Being it is that rules our destiny."
"The ancient Greeks believed this of their gods, the Jews believed it of Elijah, the Christians of their Founder."
"The best utterances of old were given from the mountaintops."
"The saints, the messiahs, were gathered to their fathers in the clouds."
"I have three theories, but none of them may be true."
"The world is too much with us; late and soon, getting and spending, we lay waste our powers."
"I only wish I could," I said, "but it’s impossible. I must be in New York by May and shan’t be home again until September."
"It is not the path that is dangerous," he answered; "my son can set you on the path. It is because of the…"
"I don’t mind admitting that what with the blizzard, and being frightened for her, I was dead beat by morning; but she came out of that mist like a spirit from another world."
"Anna’s gone," he said. "Did you know that? She’s gone."
"It’s all right," I said gently, "but it will be all right. She will come back again. You are sure to get her back."
"Oh no," he said, "she will never come back. I know her too well. She’s found what she wants."
"I wanted to get away from the wrecked plane and the pinched faces of my companions; I wanted to forget the waste of the years between."
"The whole village was astir now and intent upon watching him, held by a fearful fascination."
"I was being lighthearted just now about that night on Snowdon, but between ourselves I was quite amazed at her courage and her endurance."
"I saw them again for a brief moment, some months later, before I left for America."
"It was as if the peace of God came upon me, quiet and strong, and, with the touch of hands, took from me all anxiety and fear."
"This is what I always hoped that death would be. The negation of all pain and all distress, and the center of life flowing, not from the quibbling brain, but from the heart."
"We are both in search of the same thing, after all."
"Here Life was fulfilled, clamoring, intense, and the great heat of the sun seeped into the veins, becoming part of the bloodstream, part of the living flesh."
"In the space of so short a while my values had all changed."
"This was no closed order, gloomy, sepulchral, denying all that instinct gave the heart."
"Love and beauty don't die or fade away."
"He forgot Victor, he forgot his mission, he forgot time and place and all the years between."
"I saw her waiting for me in the tower above."
"There are no illusions and no dreams on Monte Verità."
"I’ll bring it down to you in my trailer tomorrow night."
"He wanted to be alone. He wanted no face peering from the window."
"Hack at it, blast at it, gouge at the tough tissue, throw the axe away, claw at the rubbery flesh with the bare hands."
"His first task, after felling the apple tree, was to hack off the branches and the smaller boughs, and so to grade the wood in stacks, which made it easier to drag away."
"The snow fell upon the torn boughs and the hacked branches, hampering his work."
"There was a telltale sign that spoiled the smooth lovely face, intensified."
"Life was one long sequence of resting, of getting up, and of resting again."
"She remembered the laughter, the joking with other girls, the stifled giggles when a passing man looked at them in the street, the confidences, the exchange of letters, the whispering in bedrooms when her friends came to tea."
"She made a fantasy to herself of how they would meet in secret."
"The Marquise did not tire as the children had done."
"He photographed her as she sat, lazily nibbling at a stem of grass."
"The sensation was featherweight, like the brushing of a bird’s wing against her skin."
"I will tell everybody how you have been spending your afternoons."
"The Marquise sank back on her knees. She did not move. She waited."
"But she knew that in a moment or two she must look somewhere else, or the dragonfly would go."
"I am very much afraid I have broken Paul’s heart."
"Since I have known you, everything in my life is changed. I live only for these afternoons."
"It would not matter to me, the loss of personal dignity. I am not proud."
"He was dead. He had been found. These things were known."
"Why this should be so she could not tell."
"Tomorrow Édouard would arrive, tomorrow Édouard would come in his car and drive them away, and the white dusty roads would lengthen the distance between her and the hotel."
"When I die," thought the Marquise, "I shall be punished. I don’t fool myself. I am guilty of taking life."
"She slept well for the first time for four days."
I know this is not much," she said, "but perhaps it will help just a little.
"I am glad," she said. "You’re good and kind. I’m glad."
"It’s not every night I get a free ride and a free pillow. Wake me at the bottom of the hill, before we get to the cemetery."
"I’ll take it," I said, and then asked him the price.
"You murderer, you bloody Goddamned murderer."
"I watched the two swans fly out to sea right into the face of the setting sun, and I tell you it was one of the most beautiful sights I ever saw in my life: the two swans flying there, alone, in winter."