Richard Papen Quotes

“I looked at him. There was so much I wanted to ask him, so much I wanted to say; but somehow I knew there wasn't time and even if there was, that it was all, somehow, beside the point.
"Are you happy here?" I said at last.
He considered this for a moment. "Not particularly," he said.
"But you're not very happy where you are, either.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“I thought she was going to say, because I don't love you, which probably would have been more or less the truth, but instead, to my surprise, she said: "Because I love Henry."
"Henry's dead."
"I can't help it. I still love him."
"I loved him, too," I said.
For just a moment, I thought I felt her waver. But then she looked away.
"I know you did," she said. "But it's not enough.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“In my own humorless state I failed to see anything except what I construed as certain tragic similarities between Gatsby and myself.”
― Donna Tartt

“She raised up on tiptoe and gave me a cool, soft kiss that tasted of Popsicles. Oh you, I though, my heart beating fast and shallow.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“The swish of the oars and the hypnotic thrum of dragonflies blended with his academic monotone. Camilla, flushed and sleepy, trailed her hand in the water. Yellow birch leaves blew from the trees and drifted down to rest on the surface.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“The problem, basically, was that I had been taking too many pills; the ups now, periodically, mixed with the downs, because though the latter had ceased to put me effectively to sleep, they hung me over in the daytime, so that I wandered in a perpetual twilight. Unmedicated sleep was impossible, a fairy tale, some remote childhood dream.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“There was a silence, during which I struggled for language to adequately express what I thought of this goofball advice”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“There was a silence, during which I struggled for language to adequately express what I thought of this goofball advice.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History

“No," I said, meeting his gaze but his stare was so rude I was forced to cut my eyes away.”
― Donna Tartt, The Secret History