Shireen

“These days I keep noticing how my feelings towards men - and the feelings of all the other women - are changing. We feel sorry for them; they seem so miserable and powerless. The weaker sex. Deep down we women are experiencing a kind of collective disappointment. The Nazi world - ruled by men, glorifying the strong man - is beginning to crumble, and with it the myth of "Man". In earlier wars men could claim that the privilege of killing and being killed for the fatherland was theirs and theirs alone. Today, we women, too, have a share. That has transformed us, emboldened us. Among the many defeats at the end of this war is the defeat of the male sex.”
― Marta Hillers, A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City: A Diary

“I love her, and that's the beginning and end of everything.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dear Scott, Dearest Zelda: The Love Letters of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald

“Time to leave now, get out of this room, go somewhere, anywhere; sharpen this feeling of happiness and freedom, stretch your limbs, fill your eyes, be awake, wider awake, vividly awake in every sense and every pore.”
― Stefan Zweig, The Post-Office Girl

“The only kingdom that makes any man a king is the kingdom of his own soul. The only power that has any real meaning is the power to better the world.”
― Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram