Loraine Dragula

“إن الرضا عن الذات مرادف للانحطاط والجهل، وطموح المرء خير له من قناعة زائفة تعمي عينيه وتغُل يديه،”
― Edwin A. Abbott, ‫ الأرض المسطحة‬

“The Friend of Your Youth is the only friend you will ever have, for he does not really see you. He sees in his mind a face which does not exist anymore, speaks a name which belongs to that now nonexistent face but which by some inane and doddering confusion of the universe if for the moment attached to a not to happily met and boring stranger... The Friend of Your Youth is your friend because he does not see you any more. The Friend of Your Youth is the only friend you will ever have, for he hasn't the slightest concern with calculating his interest or your virtue. He doesn't give a damn, for the moment, about Getting Ahead or Needs Must Admiring the Best, the two official criteria in adult friendships, and when the boring stranger appears, he puts out his hand and smiles (not really seeing your face) and speaks your name (which doesn't really belong to your face)”
― Robert Penn Warren, All the King's Men

“Under fire, trying to get a fugitive out of Honduras: “Their pilot hopped out of the cockpit to allow them entry room. Pack sent Keto [Belgian Malinois K-9] up first. Then he dragged Triandos up. The prisoner’s head pinged off every step on the way up. His head struck the bulkhead as Pack flung his bulk into the cabin. ‘I know there’s a protocol,’ Pack thought, ‘but whoever wrote it was never in this situation.”
― John M. Vermillion, Pack's Posse

“Mary’s childhood was rough. She was frequently beaten and chastised by the nuns who served as her protectors and brutalized by the older girls in the orphanage.

Oh how I wept those first few years of my life. My tears came like tropical storms. Every pore in my body wept. I heaved and shuddered and sighed. Everything around me seemed dark and terrifying.”
― Maria Nhambu, Africa's Child