Edward Carey > Quotes

“Though we longed not to be lonely, we also feared the pain it would take us to be brought out of our lonely states. And after that fear, could we be guaranteed that we would never be returned to a state of loneliness again? We could not.”
― Edward Carey, Observatory Mansions

“What casual monsters we are. What calamities we are capable of.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“During relaxation we drop our guard. Particularly in conversation. Relaxed conversation leads to openness. And in openness we often reveal what should never be revealed.”
― Edward Carey, Observatory Mansions

“What is a life? That is what we were left with: stories. They were our clothes.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Here is a truth: people are very fascinated by themselves.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“So I learned not only that your loved one may be forbidden you, given away to someone else, but also that though you love someone they may run from you, and you may open your arms but they shall not come in.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Another human being, yet another I had never seen before. What did this one know? Was he happy? Was he cruel? Did he worry? The more I stared at his face, the less I understood him. This is not unusual, the same procedure happens whenever I examine a person either on photograph or in reality: in my first glimpses I always think I can read someone fairly quickly, that the snap judgements I make are surely accurate, but the more I observe the less I understand, the more I realize how difficult the art of judging a person is.”
― Edward Carey, Observatory Mansions

“Elisabeth hungered after pain, other people’s pain to dull her own; the pain of those poor everyday people fed her life. She had become addicted to misery.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Adults, I understand, have many faults, they are not perfect—even though they have lived longer, even though they offer themselves as examples to children. They are larger, that is certain, and size has an unearned authority. But they are easily influenced, and they can be easily swayed.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Why was she always so cruel, I wondered, even after I had worked so hard for her? Perhaps she needed someone beneath her to know for certain that she was not on the bottom rung. Perhaps being cruel was proof of her success.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Les gens qui ont de l'argent sont libres, après tout, d'être aussi bizarres qu'ils le veulent.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“I collect the walks of my life. Some people have asked me if I have walked so very far to merit such an activity, but I say to them, it's not about how far you have walked, but how thoroughly.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“These were desperate times, the two men agreed; it was easy to stay at home and pull the bedcovers over your heads, but if nothing was done, someone would rip the bedcovers from your face and tug you naked into the street.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“I put myself away. I came up with the great vanishing system, in which I could retreat so deep within myself that, though I might still appear the same creature, actually I was very different. I thrust all thoughts and feelings into the depths of me, where they were safe, but in an outward way I became something like an automation.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“A woman's death is a simple enough thing perhaps; women will always be dying about the place; no doubt several women have died as I have been writing this sentence; only this one woman who concerns me now, this one woman tied up to the rafters, unlike all the others in the world - this woman was my mother. Before, I had always had Mother to hide behind; now I was exposed. Her death was not a quiet, thinking-death like Father's had been, her death was about business; it was all hurried action; Mother had jolted herself out of life.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“Mi pantalonai.
Me li infilai, come se stessi amputandomi le gambe.
Adesso, mi dissi, per te tutto il mondo sarà in flanella grigia.
L’avevo indossata, ne avevo fatto un sacco per chiuderci dentro l’infanzia. Come mi sentivo? Superiore? Vecchio? Saggio? Più pesante? Più forte? Mi trovavo eretto e diretto e di bell’aspetto, lusingato e favorevolmente impressionato?
No, per niente.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“that, seeing some great sadness, they will feel they have lived a little themselves and feel the more human besides. We are here to remind the human what the human may be, what he is capable of, both the good and the terrible. We teach the humans, in short, about the human.”
― Edward Carey, Edith Holler

“Some things are missing from the world and they will never be replaced.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“«Ma come hai fatto capirlo, Clod?» si erano stupiti i miei parenti. «Come hai fatto a capire che la spilla da balia era lì?»
«L’ho sentita gridare,» avevo risposto.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“We sat in the kitchen together and Jacques in his growl let out small, bloody miserable tales of unfortunate people leaving life in a hurry.”
― Edward Carey

“I blame the pencil. I hadn't meant to do it. I wasn't thinking. It just happened that way.”
― Edward Carey, B: A Year in Plagues and Pencils

“This little box, this chapter, ends here, sealed tight from those others that surround it, so that those other people of different chapters may not come in here and disturb, so that its vault may be sealed up, never spilling beyond its boundaries but kept tight shut and precious, and Godly and triumphant, and wonderful too.”
― Edward Carey

“Era una cosa lucida, era una cosa da stringere, e in qualche modo la vita ti sembra molto migliore quando hai qualcosa da stringere.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“Mi sentivo perduta, abbandonata, cacciata, sputata via, sepolta, gettata in un'enorme fossa. Piccola. Piccolissima. Consapevole, lì nel buio freddo, della mia esiguità, dell'assoluta impossibilità di essere grande. Briciola. Scheggia. Cosa perduta. Piccola cosa perduta. Ecco come mi sentivo. Qualcosa del genere. Ma non era tutto. Non ancora. Perché lasciata lì, da sola nei cumuli, mi sentivo come se fossi morta, totalmente morta, defunta, spacciata, destinata a non essere ricordata mai da nessuno, mai nemmeno esistita, ignota a chiunque e per sempre. Ecco, così.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“We count ourselves in sadness. So many human lives must wait and wait for their dramatic moments—months and years between events, and sometimes they never come at all. A life may rise and fall and when distilled will prove to have involved scarcely an instant of worthwhile theatre.”
― Edward Carey, Edith Holler

“Monkey”
― Edward Carey, Little

“She was always struggling over what was the best way to react. There were so many contradictions between what she was told and what she saw that she could only hesitatingly move forward, lacking, as she did, power and knowledge. She was a girl trying to make her way.”
― Edward Carey, Little

“E freddo, più freddo che nelle giornate d’inverno, quando il fiato si addensa nell’aria e le pozzanghere si ghiacciano, e ti scotti le dita quando tocchi il metallo e tremi e rabbrividisci anche se ti sei vestita con strati di roba pesante, e hai la sensazione che non riuscirai più a scaldarti mai più nella vita. Ancora più freddo di così. E disperato, senza barlume di speranza. E la sensazione di essere morta. Smarrita per sempre da tutti. Sepolta viva negli abissi all’insaputa di tutti. E la sensazione di inutilità, di essere a pezzi e sola. Nel buio gelido. Ecco come mi sentivo.
Mi sono spenta, pensai.
Mi sono estinta.
Non sono più accesa.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“Les gens en couple finissent souvent par se ressembler, j'avais déjà vu cela. Ils ne formaient qu'un, les Groom, il était difficile de les distinguer l'un de l'autre, tous deux avaient de la poitrine, tous deux des hanches, tous deux de grosses mains, et tous deux étaient habillés des mêmes vêtements blancs, marque de leur emploi.”
― Edward Carey, Heap House

“Per questo, nel giorno della maniglia perduta, indugiavo con la faccia accostata alla finestra rotta, fantasticando su tutta quella gente dall’altro lato dei cumuli, chiedendomi se sarei mai riuscito a spingermi fino alla città laggiù, Forlichingham, a Londra, immaginando che ci fosse qualcuno dietro tutta quella gente, qualcuno che potesse apprezzarmi.
«C’è qualcuno,» sussurrai, «c’è qualcuno lì? Chi sei? Come sei fatto?»”
― Edward Carey, Heap House