Dora Carson

“Whenever someone who knows you disappears, you lose one version of yourself. Yourself as you were seen, as you were judged to be. Lover or enemy, mother or friend, those who know us construct us, and their several knowings slant the different facets of our characters like diamond-cutter's tools. Each such loss is a step leading to the grave, where all versions blend and end.”
― Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet

“What's this flesh? A little cruded milk
Fantastical puff-paste. Our bodies are weaker than those
Paper prisons boys use to keep flies in; more contemptible,
Since our is to preserve earth-worms. Didst thou ever seen
A lark in a cage? Such is the soul in the body: this world
Is like her little turf of grass, and the heaven o'er our heads
Like her looking-glass, only gives us a miserable knowledge
Of the small compass of our prison.”
― John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi

“I account this world a tedious theater,
For I do play a part in 't 'gainst my will.”
― John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi