Sofía

“The water can't turn back and choose another bed, just as promises now cannot be kept. No drowned man comes up again asking for a towel, no love is found again, no tobacconist fails to be born in the first place, no bullet shoots out of a neck and back into the gun, the dam will hold or will not hold.”
― Saša Stanišić, How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone

“A good story, you'd have said, is like our river Drina: never calm, it doesn't trickle along, it is rough and broad, tributaries flow in to enrich it, it rises above its banks, it bubbles and roars, here and there it flows into shallows but then it comes to rapids again, preludes to the depths where there's no splashing. But one thing neither the Drina nor the stories can do: there's no going back for any of them. The water can't turn back and choose another bed, just as promises now can't be kept. No drowned man comes up again asking for a towel, no love is found again, no tobacconist fails to be born in the first place, no bullet shoots out of a neck and back into the gun, the dam will hold or will not hold. The Drina has no delta.”
― Saša Stanišić, How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone

“The fact is that everything I have in my pockets is carefully chosen so I’ll always be prepared. Everything is there so I can be at an advantage at the moment of truth. Actually, that’s not accurate. Everything’s there so I won’t be at a disadvantage at the moment of truth.”
― Etgar Keret, פתאום דפיקה בדלת

“-Sí, al borde del vacío comprendió lo más importante - maulló Zorbas.
-Ah, sí? Y qué es lo que comprendió -preguntó el humano.
-Que sólo vuela el que se atreve a hacerlo - maulló Zorbas.”
― Luis Sepúlveda, The Story of a Seagull and the Cat Who Taught Her to Fly