Elisabeth

“Many Fujiyamas lie in a row along our coast to the south. As the distance increases, their sombre blackness seems to be lit up by a deep red light. They take on every shade from red to lilac, and all the colours have a glowing depth that is neved found in the landscape at home, or at most only in some exquisite flowers. In the holy stillness, everything is lit by a supernatural brightness. Two gulls fly low and silent close by the hut toward the fiord. They are lit up by the red rays of the bright sun. Their magnificent broad wings are a deep pink in the turquoise sky.”
― Christiane Ritter, A Woman in the Polar Night

“And suddenly I realise that civilisation is suffering from a severe vitamin deficiency, because it cannot draw its strength directly from nature, eternally young and eternally true.”
― Christiane Ritter, A Woman in the Polar Night

“No, the Arctic does not yield its secret for the price of a ship's ticket. You must live through the long night, the storms, and the destruction of human pride. You must have gazed on the deadness of all things to grasps their livingness. In the return of light, in the magic of the ice, in the life-rhythm of the animals observed in the wilderness, in the natural laws of all being, revealed here in their completeness, lies the secret of the Arctic and the overpowering beauty of its lands.”
― Christiane Ritter, A Woman in the Polar Night

“That’s history. It happened whether it offends you or not. Quite a bit of it offends me, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”
― Octavia E. Butler, Kindred