The High Mountains Of Portugal Quotes
"The morning has broken bright and mild, and the walk will soothe him."
"He feels the breast pocket of his jacket. Father Ulisses’ diary is there, wrapped in a soft cloth."
"But he needs extra moral support this morning, as he does every time he visits his uncle."
"For that, the cane is useful, because memories of her always throw him off balance."
"You are my family," he replied, looking straight at her.
"His eyes, for the most part relieved of the burden of directing him, relax in his skull like two passengers sitting on deck chairs at the rear of a ship."
"Marry me, marry me, marry me," he pleaded. "We will be each other’s wealth."
"In the course of one week—his heart became undone like a bursting cocoon."
"Emerging from it came no butterfly but a grey moth that settled on the wall of his soul and stirred no farther."
"He does not see an approaching carriage as he steps off a curb, but the driver’s cry alerts him and he scampers out of the way of the horse."
"One step at a time, every few steps turning his head to glance over his shoulder at what lies onward, Tomás makes his way to Lapa walking backwards."
"Because when everything cherished by you in life has been taken away, what else is there to do but object?"
"Loneliness comes up to him like a sniffing dog. It circles him insistently."
"He came upon Father Ulisses’ diary mere weeks after his life was irretrievably blighted."
"The death of a white man causes a greater breach on this pestilent island than it does in Lisbon."
"Love is a house with many rooms, this room to feed the love, this one to entertain it, this one to clean it, this one to dress it, this one to allow it to rest."
"Tomás is overcome with saudade. He is, as the expression goes, tão docemente triste quanto um rinoceronte, as sweetly sad as a rhinoceros."
"Weeping is nothing new to him. He has wept many, many times since death dealt him a triple blow."
"He doubted that Cardinal Valdereis had ever read the volume; in fact, given that there was no archival note attached to the cover or anywhere inside—no catalogue number, no date, no comment—and no reference to the book in the index, he had the distinct impression that no one had ever read it."
"His grief seeks the man who is leading him to the High Mountains of Portugal."
"It is a good hour before he heads off. The problem does not lie in starting the automobile. That, after seeing Sabio do it so many times, is manageable."
"Nourishing this silence are two emotions: despair and rage. Or, as Father Ulisses puts it, 'the black pit & the red fire.'"
"The sun brings no solace, nor does sleep. Food no longer sates me, nor the company of men. Merely to breathe is to display an optimism I do not feel."
"No matter their provenance—what territory, what tribe—the slaves soon sink to the same saturnine behaviour."
"I find small shrines on the plantations, set up in remote locations. They are crudely made of wood or baked mud, with shells & rotting fruit lying about them."
"A darkness blooms in me, a choking algae of the soul. I chew slowly. It does not taste bad, only is unpleasant on the teeth."
"Today I saw a fight on a plantation. Two slaves clashed. Others stood about, with stupefied expressions. A female slave, the object of contention, looked on, impassive, indifferent."
"I was summoned by the Bishop today. I told him that I had met the unequal & in meeting them found them equal. We are no better than they, I told him."
"I know my mission now. I will make this gift to God before death takes me. I thank God that I drew a sketch while I was at García’s, visiting her in her hellish confinement."
"I entered that cell thinking I was a Christian man. I walked out knowing I was a Roman soldier. We are no better than animals."
"I saw a fight on a plantation. The more the overseers exert themselves to change this behaviour, freely using the whip, the more it becomes ingrained."
"We are random animals. That is who we are, and we have only ourselves, nothing more—there is no greater relationship."
"The world of the Gospels is stark. There is much suffering in it, suffering of the body, suffering of the soul."
"Every dead body is a book with a story to tell, each organ a chapter, the chapters united by a common narrative."
"He considers himself a careful practitioner. He examines the paragraph he has been working on the way a farmer might look back at a freshly sowed furrow."
"Every death is felt by someone as a murder, as the unjust taking of a loved being."
"Strangest of all, we knew what to do. It all fell into place. We touched, we asked, we did, all in one go."
"I had to marry at some point. You don’t want to live your whole life alone."
"The miracles of Jesus, Jesus benefitting the human body, Jesus walking on water, Jesus the allegorist saved by other allegorists."
"The only modern genre that plays on the same high moral register as the Gospels is the lowly regarded murder mystery."
"Disease most often develops from the inside to the outside."
"Organs are siblings that work in the same family business."
"What’s the point of being a mother if you have no one to mother?"
"Grief is a disease. We were riddled with its pockmarks, tormented by its fevers, broken by its blows."
"His death made little difference to the outside world."
"When a child dies, there is no land to be handed down, hardly any possessions to be divided up."
"Memory was just an occasional pleasure. Then it’s all you’re left with."
"The heart has two choices: to shut down or to open up."
"Faith is ever young, how faith, unlike the rest of us, does not age."
"I understand it in the main, but it comes through a fog."
"It’s a lesson hard learned, just to sit there and be."
"It’s not fear, that’s not what he would call it anymore."
"The animals live in a sort of emotional amnesia centered in the present moment."
"Every conflict between Odo and the dogs ends in this way, with all tensions revealed and expelled."
"He’s learned to unshackle himself from the race of time and contemplate time itself."
"Peter has learned the difficult animal skill of doing nothing."
"Grooming confounds Peter. The ape is so proximately alien: in his image—but not."
"Instead he would prefer to be kind to everyone, a less personal but broader love."
"She will be his link to the rest of the village. More importantly, she will be Odo’s link, the ape’s ambassador."
"It’s a reward in the mystery, an enduring amazement."
"He accepts it with gratitude. These rewards come unexpectedly."
"While Odo learned to make porridge, Peter has learned to do nothing."
"He’s been touched by the grace of the ape, and there’s no going back to being a plain human being."
"He’s never come into the church with Odo, not wanting to risk it."
"But it’s much more than that. He’s been touched by the grace of the ape."
"Turmoil and upheaval are like storm clouds, bursting dramatically but exhausting themselves quickly."
"It’s a curious love, if so. One that strips him of any privilege."
"Unexpectedly, without any effort, the transient renter has found the house where he was born."