“Because nothing is as good as you can imagine it. No one is as beautiful as she is in your head. Nothing is as exciting as your fantasy.”
― Asfixia
― Asfixia
“It struck him that in moments of crisis one is never fighting against an external enemy, but always against one’s own body... On the battlefield, in the torture chamber, on a sinking ship, the issues that you are fighting for are always forgotten, because the body swells up until it fills the universe, and even when you are not paralysed by fright or screaming with pain, life is a moment-to-moment struggle against hunger or cold or sleeplessness, against a sour stomach or an aching tooth.”
― 1984
― 1984
“God preserve you, my dear boy, from ever asking forgiveness for a fault from a woman you love. From one you love especially, however greatly you may have been in fault. For a woman--devil only knows what to make of a woman: I know something about them, anyway. But try acknowledging you are in fault to a woman. Say, "I am sorry, forgive me," and a shower of reproaches will follow! Nothing will make her forgive you simply and directly, she'll humble you to the dust, bring forward things that have never happened, recall everything, forget nothing, add something of her own, and only then forgive you. And even the best, the best of them do it. She'll scrape up all the scrapings and load them on your head. They are ready to flay you alive, I tell you, every one of them, all these angels without whom we cannot live! I tell you plainly and openly, dear boy, every decent man ought to be under some woman's thumb. That's my conviction--not conviction, but feeling. A man ought to be magnanimous, and it's no disgrace to a man! No disgrace to a hero, not even a Caesar! But don't ever beg her pardon all the same for anything...”
― The Brothers Karamazov
― The Brothers Karamazov
“A good story should make you laugh, and a moment later break your heart.”
― Stranger than Fiction
― Stranger than Fiction
“I wish sometimes you had a few bad motives, you might understand a little more about human beings.”
― The Quiet American
― The Quiet American
Harry’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Harry’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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