Burke > Burke's Quotes

“Women, they have minds, and they have souls, as well as just hearts. And they’ve got ambition, and they’ve got talent, as well as just beauty. I’m so sick of people saying that love is all a woman is fit for.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“Fairy tales are full of girls who wait, who endure, who suffer. Good girls. Obedient girls. Girls who crush nettles until their hands bleed. Girls who haul water for witches. Girls who wander through deserts or sleep in ashes or make homes for transformed brothers in the woods. Girls without hands, without eyes, without the power of speech, without any power at all. But then a prince rides up and sees the girl and finds her beautiful. Beautiful, not despite her suffering, but because of it.”
― Holly Black, The Lost Sisters

“We walked along the river with the words streaming behind us like ribbons in the night.”
― Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees

“This time I read the title of the painting: Girl Interrupted at Her Music. Interrupted at her music: as my life had been, interrupted in the music of being seventeen, as her life had been, snatched and fixed on canvas: one moment made to stand still and to stand for all the other moments, whatever they would be or might have been. What life can recover from that?”
― Susanna Kaysen, Girl, Interrupted

“Every window in Alcatraz has a view of San Francisco. ”
― Susanna Kaysen, Girl, Interrupted

“And I was struck all at once how life was out there going through its regular courses, and I was suspended, waiting, caught in a terrible crevice between living my life and not living it.”
― Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees

“Men were always quick to believe in the madness of women.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“Place a beehive on my grave
And let the honey soak through.
When I'm dead and gone,
That's what I want from you.
The streets of heaven are gold and sunny,
But I'll stick with my plot and a pot of honey.
Place a beehive on my grave
And let the honey soak through.”
― Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees

“They say you’re not punished for your sins, you’re punished by them.”
― Anonymous, Diary of an Oxygen Thief

“There was a saying that the strength of a man’s steel was only known under the hammer of circumstance. If anyone had asked me a few hours ago, I would have said that nearly five years of boyhood had hammered me into constant fear and excessive caution. But now I realised it had done the opposite. It had shaped me into someone who stepped forwards and reached for what she wanted. It was too late for me to tuck my hands behind my back and wait like a good woman.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“You have seen me at my worst and at my weakest. Let me show you my best.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“I know that love is about power, too. Who gives, who takes. Who is willing to risk showing their true self.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“History does not care about the suffering of the individual. Only the outcome of their struggles.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“Too many doubts grow in the cracks of silence and separation.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“You lie even to yourself. Now that is the mark of a fool.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“There was a saying that the strength of a man’s steel was only known under the hammer of circumstance.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“For almost five years I had lived as a boy, and even as a lowly candidate I'd had more freedom than this role as a woman.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“Of course, you have already punched me in the throat and tried to stab me with a sword, but I know you would never hurt me.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“You are wrong when you say there is no power in being a woman. When I think of my mother and the women in my tribe, and the hidden women in the harem, I know there are many types of power in this world...I found power in accepting the truth of who I am. It may not be a truth that others can accept, but I cannot live any other way. How would it be to live a lie every minute of your life? I don't think I could do it.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“A man who lifts his chin in pride will fail to see the chasm at his feet.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“in the end, power is always used to gain more power. That is the nature of the beast.”
― Alison Goodman, Eona: The Last Dragoneye

“There was a saying that a man's true character was revealed in defeat. I thought it was also revealed in victory.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“He grunted. 'You have the courage of a warrior.'
I watched him turn away and gather the clothes from the ground. He thought me courageous? But I was terrified - always terrified.
'No,' I said flatly. 'I don't."
He paused from stuffing the invaluable robe between two bales. 'Are you frightened now?'
I nodded, shame flushing my skin.
'Is it going to stop you?'
'No.'
'That is the courage of a warrior.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“Even a cornered rabbit will fight with teeth and claws.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“Even a leaf in the wind settles sometimes.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“It was Dolana, at the salt farm, who first told me about the gaze of men: that look of temporary possession that some men pressed against female flesh. About its dangers and possibilities. It can be used to survive, Dolana had said softly, showing me the power that lay in reflecting a man's desire. And even at twelve years old, the knowledge of it was already in the way I moved my head, my hands, my shoulders. But Dolana had whispered her secrets to a girl. And I had to become a boy. I had to stop being alert to the turn of a man's head towards me. Stop glancing up to meet his gaze in fleeting connection. Stop falsely veiling my eyes from his momentary interest. It was hard to train out of my body, but I practised and learned to cloak myself in the skin and gaze of a boy.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“How could I explain that it was not all playacting? That I felt more of the male spirit within me than the female - a fierceness that whittled me down to a sharpened spear of ambition. And as a boy, I was applauded, not punished, for such raw energy. It was not beaten out of me for my own good, or worn away by women's chores.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“No one can ever truly know what is in another man’s heart.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“A drowning man groping for a twig.”
― Alison Goodman, Eon: Dragoneye Reborn

“There are many Beths in the world, shy and quiet, sitting in corners till needed, and living for others so cheerfully that no one sees the sacrifices till the little cricket on the hearth stops chirping, and the sweet, sunshiny presence vanishes, leaving silence and shadow behind.”
― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women