Elswyth Thane > Quotes

“A house you came to love was like a person, and loved you back, and then you belonged to it forever.”
― Elswyth Thane, Ever After

“There, there," she said. "Don't take it so hard, Dee. Wars don't last forever. I know. I can remember...”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“It's nice to be loved for one's faults and not one's virtues!" "...Knowing that whatever you do or however badly you behave, he still feels the way he said just now." "But if people really love each other their faults don't matter," said Bracken..Dinah regarded him with large, serious eyes. "I wonder how many people could say that," she murmured.”
― Elswyth Thane, Ever After

“You will not always be happy, my dear, however wise you are--I wasn't--but always take what comes to you--don't fight life, Camilla, accept it with grace...”
― Elswyth Thane, Kissing Kin

“She knew by some sure instinct that when you had come right up against it, as Jeff had, you had no use for people who advised you to brace up, or who pointed out bright spots. She know that there is nothing so infuriating, when you are bearing all you can, as shallow, unrealistic optimism from someone who has not experienced the same disaster.”
― Elswyth Thane, This Was Tomorrow

“They were so young, so gloriously, obliviously young, that it hurt to look at them.”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“It is always the Germans who cause the trouble, what is it about Germans that they must molest and oppress?..." "They have never been civilized," said Sosthene..."They were never conquered by Roman. They remain barbarians." Phoebe stared at him. It was a viewpoint... "One is perhaps inclined to forget that even here in Britain that were four hundred years of the Pax Romana," he said gently. "In Germany, no -- only the Vandals and the Goths. Every so often they burst out. It is in the breed.”
― Elswyth Thane, The Light Heart

“Any time I'm happier with you drowned in the river, I belong in the Asylum.”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“I'm emptied of all personal feeling about this war, I could become simply an efficient machine with a woman's touch, and that's what a good nurse ought to be.”
― Elswyth Thane, Kissing Kin

“He laid her hands, palms upward, against his face, and she sat looking down at his bent head, a little disturbed in her soul that he should fling away his principles and his convictions quite so heedlessly for her sake. Mr. Murray, for instance, seemed not to have altered his chosen course a single degree because of Eden. Of course Mr. Murray was a Yankee. Virginia men, she had heard, were more considerate.”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“St. John had now seen war first hand, and it seemed to him both hideous and infuriating.”
― Elswyth Thane, Dawn's Early Light

“He had been amused, and sometimes stimulated, and once or twice rather attracted, but he had never been stirred as this honest, laughing Virginia girl had stirred him, with her level green gaze and her odd little dignity, and her sweet reposefulness which was just her breeding.”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“[t]hey were so young-so gloriously, obviously young, that it hurt to look at them.”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“Now, now, you musn't cry either, you know it makes wrinkles!...I have been on bad terms with myself for some time, you could see that.”
― Elswyth Thane, Dawn's Early Light

“You don't know how I envy you growing up in a big family like that, and how wonderful it seems to somebody like me that there can be a whole party, enough for dancing and music and applause, without ever going outside the family!”
― Elswyth Thane, Kissing Kin

“It's”
― Elswyth Thane, Dawn's Early Light

“Can’t have you dying of the climate straight off, you know! Must give malaria a chance!”
― Elswyth Thane, Dawn's Early Light

“I've seen you by candlelight, and midday, and firelight--and in a thunderstorm. And if I were struck blind as I stand here I would see you till I die as you are now, with tears on your cheeks, because I don't take you in my arms and fight the whole boiling lot of them for you!”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“You see, ma’am, I believe in the power and the freedom of the Press. I believe that reporting a war, or a political convention, is a solemn responsibility. Our free educational system is teaching a great mass of people to read. Well, then, it seems to me we ought to be damned careful, begging your pardon, what we hand out to them for a penny or two, to read. Newspapers are being read like the word of God by millions—and who writes them?”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“Laurel for you—can you stay on?”
― Elswyth Thane, Yankee Stranger

“What do you want me to say?” she asked.
“Whatever you like, in heaven’s name!” he told her firmly. “Will you do that for me? Will you always utter whatever comes into your funny little head, and trust me to make some sort of intelligent guess at what you mean and what the answer is?”
― Elswyth Thane , The Light Heart