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“Milena, if a million loved you, I am one of them, and if one loved you, it was me, if no one loved you then know that I am dead.”
― Franz Kafka, Letters to Milena

“He saw me watching and rubbed self-consciously at his calloused hands. “I know I am ugly to you.” No, I thought. My grandfather’s halls are filled with shining nymphs and muscled river-gods, but I would rather gaze on you than any of them.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe

“Everywhere I went, I would be looking for her. In every pair of eyes I would be searching for the Madonna in a fur coat. I knew from the outset that I would never find her. Yet it was not in my power to give up searching. She had condemned me to a lifelong quest for a cipher for someone that did not exist. She should never have done this to me”
― Ali Sabahatin, Madona u bundi

“Having never known such intimacy before, I was desperate to protect it. And perhaps what I desired most was to possess her wholly and absolutely, body and soul, but I was so fearful of losing what I already had that I did not dare look away from it. I was, in effect, watching the most beautiful bird in all creation and keeping perfectly still for fear of frightening it away with a sudden movement.”
― Sabahattin Ali, Madonna in a Fur Coat