Stacia

“I have not set myself the goal of recording senatorial proposals, except in cases where they are remarkable for their integrity, or notoriously discreditable. For I think it is a special duty of history to see that virtues are not left unrecorded, and also that fear of disgrace in posterity attends iniquitous words and actions. But those times were so corrupt and contaminated with sycophancy that men competed with each other in standing up and making foul and outrageous proposals. And it was not just the leading citizens of the community who did so, either, men who had to protect their distinction with servility; so, too, did all the ex-consuls, most ex-praetors, and even many of the lower-ranking senators. The story goes that, whenever he left the Curia, Tiberius was in the habit of declaring, in Greek: 'Ah, men ready to be slaves!' Clearly, while he objected to the freedom of the people, he was also sickened by such abject submission from his 'slaves'.

(From Book Three, Chapter 65)”
― Tacitus, The Annals: The Reigns of Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero

“I said, 'How would you define psychosis?'
He wrote on a piece of paper with his pencil:
Psychosis: out of touch with reality.
Since then, I have been trying to find out what reality is, so that I can touch it.”
― Jeanette Winterson, Lighthousekeeping

“When I reached her room, I didn't go in. I sat on the floor outside her door, and I cried the tears I knew I wouldn't be able to bring forth once she was gone. I cried tears for the poet and through her I cried tears for my mother and for my father. I must have fallen asleep right there in the corridor, for I was woken when the sun took over from the moon, by a nurse arriving to check on Kingfisher. She took me wordlessly to the staff room and made me a cup of coffee with both milk and sugar, and gave me tissues to wipe my face. How many kind strangers there are, for all of us, and how often they know the value of silence and soft hands.”
― Rozie Kelly, Kingfisher

“There was an ending—there always is—but the story went on past the ending—it always does.”
― Jeanette Winterson, Lighthousekeeping