Valent > Recent Status Updates

"Se les podía hacer aceptar las violaciones más flagrantes de la realidad, porque nunca iban a comprender la enormidad de lo que se les exigía, y no estaban lo suficientemente interesados en los acontecimientos públicos como para darse cuenta de lo que estaba ocurriendo en realidad. Se mantenían cuerdos gracias a la falta de comprensión. Ellos simplemente se limitaban a tragarselo todo".

"Ya apenas sabemos nada acerca de la Revolución y los años anteriores a ella. Todos los registros han sido destruidos o falsificados, cada libro ha sido reescrito, cada cuadro ha sido repintado, cada fecha ha sido alterada. Y ese proceso continúa día a día. La historia se ha detenido. No existe nada, excepto un presente interminable en el que el partido siempre tiene la razón".

"Winston pensó que todo aquello era cierto. Había una relación directa e íntima entre la castidad y la ortodoxia política. ¿Cómo se iban a mantener vivos el miedo y el odio y la enloquecida incredulidad que el partido necesitaba por parte de sus miembros, si no era mediante la represión de un instinto poderoso para usarlo luego como motivación?"

"En los viejos tiempos, pensó, un hombre miraba el cuerpo de una chica y veía que era deseable, y ahí se acababa la historia. Pero hoy día, no se podía sentir amor puro o deseo puro. Ninguna emoción era pura, porque todo estaba mezclado con el miedo y el odio. Su abrazo había sido una batalla, el clímax de una victoria. Era un golpe contra el partido. Era un acto político".

"Lo había hecho decenas de veces: deseó que hubiesen sido cientos. Cualquier cosa que indicara una corrupción lo llenaba de una tremenda esperanza. A lo mejor el Partido estaba podrido bajo la superficie y la negación de uno mismo no era más una farsa que ocultaba su iniquidad. ¡Si hubiera podido contagiarles a todos la lepra, lo habría hecho. Cualquier cosa con tal de que se pudrieran, debilitarlos y de minarlos!"

"Tal vez un loco simplemente no era más que una minoría de uno solo. En el pasado, creer que la Tierra giraba alrededor del sol se había considerado un síntoma de locura: hoy lo era creer que el pasado es inalterable.
...
Al final, el Partido anunciaría que dos más dos eran cinco, y tendrías que creértelo. Era inevitable que llegaran a eso más tarde o más temprano: la lógica de su situación lo exigía".

"Mantenerlos bajo control no era difícil. Siempre había infiltrados entre ellos unos agentes que eliminaban a los individuos que se les consideraba que podían ser peligrosos, pero no se intentaba adoctrinarlos con la ideología del partido. No era deseable que los proles tuviesen un intenso sentimiento político. Lo único que se les exigía era un patriotismo primitivo al cual apelar cuando fuese necesario".

"El corazón le dio un vuelco. ¡Ha empezado!, pensó. ¡Una revuelta, por fin se han revelado los proles!
...
Y sin embargo, aunque solo fue por un momento, ¡qué poder casi aterrador había albergado aquel grito procedente de únicamente unos cuantos cientos de gargantas! ¿Por qué nunca gritaban así por algo que de verdad tuviera importancia?"

"Si el Partido podía modificar el pasado y decir qué tal acontecimiento «nunca había sucedido», eso, con toda seguridad, ¿no sería más aterrador que la tortura y la muerte?
«Quién controla el pasado, controla el futuro. Quién controla el presente, controla el pasado», era la consigna del Partido. Y, sin embargo, el pasado, aunque alterable por naturaleza, nunca había sido alterado".

"Al futuro o al pasado, a una época en la que se pueda pensar libremente, en la que los hombres sean distintos los unos de los otros y no vivan en solitario, a una época en la que la verdad exista y lo que se hace no se pucda deshacer: desde esta era de la uniformidad, desde la era de la soledad, desde la era del Hermano Mayor, desde la era del doblepensar, ¡saludos!"

> La aventura de los tres estudiantes

"–Desde luego que no –dijo Holmes de todo corazón–. Vamos, Watson. En cuanto a usted, caballero, confío en que le aguarde un brillante porvenir en Rhodesia. Por una vez ha caído usted bajo. Veamos lo alto que puede llegar en el futuro".

"Sometimes I wonder, if I was Graham, maybe I would have wanted a baby, too. If I knew someone else would raise it, someone else would let go of their own dreams, someone else would sacrifice and keep everything together while I went and did what I wanted and came back on weekends…maybe then I might want a baby, too.
Although, I don’t know. I’m still not sure that I would".

"But at some point, you have to recognize that you have no control over anybody and you have to step back and be ready to catch them when they fall and that’s all you can do. It feels like throwing yourself to sea. Or, maybe not that. Maybe it’s more like throwing someone you love out to sea and then praying they float on their own, knowing they might well drown and you’ll have to watch".

"He said that if I did it, I’d regret it for the rest of my life. He just didn’t understand.
I wasn’t scared of regretting not having a child. But I was scared of regretting having a child.
I was scared of bringing an unwanted life into this world. I was scared of living my life, feeling like I’d anchored myself to the wrong dock. I was scared of being pushed to do something I knew I did not want".

"They say the first year of marriage is the hardest and I really took that to heart back then. I wish someone had told me that love isn’t torture. Because I thought love was this thing that was supposed to tear you in two and leave you heartbroken and make your heart race in the worst way. I didn't know that it was supposed to make you lighter, not heavier. I thought love was war".

"But loving somebody isn’t perfection and good times and laughing and making love. Love is forgiveness and patience and faith and every once in a while, it’s a gut punch. That’s why it’s a dangerous thing, when you go loving the wrong person. When you love somebody who doesn’t deserve it. You have to be with someone that deserves your faith and you have to be deserving of someone else's. It's sacred".

"Think of how you sing when you’re singing to the radio at full volume. When you can’t hear yourself, you’re not afraid to really belt it out because you won’t have to cringe when your voice breaks or you veer off-key. Daisy needed that kind of freedom. That takes a crapload of confidence. And Daisy didn’t actually have confidence. She was always good. Confidence is being okay being bad, not being okay being good".

"I think people that are too similar…they don’t mix well. I used to think soul mates were two of the same. I used to think I was supposed to look for somebody that was just like me.
I don’t believe in soul mates anymore. But if I did believe in them, I’d believe your soul mate was somebody who had all the things you didn’t, that needed all the things you had. Not somebody who’s suffering from the same stuff you are".

"BILLY: It was called “Aurora.” Because Camila…she was my aurora. She was my new dawn, my daybreak, my sun peeking over the horizon. She was all of it.
It was just a piano melody at that point, but I had all the lyrics. So I sat down at the piano and played it for her.
CAMILA: The first time I heard it, I cried. I mean, you know the song. It would have been impossible for me to not feel bowled over by those words".

"When you’re in a situation like that, when you have a man looming over you, it’s as if every decision you made to lead to that moment—alone with a man you don’t trust—flashes before your eyes.
Something tells me men don’t do that same thing. When they are standing there, threatening a woman, I doubt they count every wrong step they made to become the asshole they are. But they should".

"Except for rehearsals, that was the first time I went onto a stage by myself, with just my backing band that Hank had put together. It was the first time I heard a crowd that big roar for me. All these people, coming together, looking and sounding like a living being. This booming, bellowing, living thing. Once I felt that, I wanted to feel that all the time".

"KAREN: The whole world was a man’s world but the recording industry… it wasn’t easy. You had to get some guy’s approval to do just about anything and it seemed like there were two ways to go about it. You either acted like one of the boys, which is the way I had found. Or you acted real girlie and flirty and batted your eyelashes. They liked that. But Daisy, from the beginning, was sort of outside of all that".

"KAREN: Camila wanted kids. Me, I always knew kids weren’t in the cards for me. I think it’s a feeling you get. I think you have it in your heart or you don’t.
And you can’t put it in your heart if it’s not there.
And you can’t pull it out of your heart if it is.
And it was in Camila’s heart".

"BILLY: Everything was happening so fast. And when you start to feel real success, you have to stop and ask yourself if you think you really deserve it. Anyone that isn’t a complete asshole will come up with the answer “No.” Because of course you don’t. When guys you grew up with are working three jobs. Or they’re lost overseas like we lost Chuck. Of course you don’t deserve it".

"BILLY: Teddy told me once, “What your sound is, is a feeling. That’s it.”
I was writing about love. We were rockin’ hard on the guitars. So I was thinking Teddy might say, you know, “taking a girl home from a bar” or “speeding with the top down,” or something like that. Something fun, maybe, and a little dangerous.
But he just said, “It’s ineffable. If I could define it, I wouldn’t have any use for it".

"She’d come watch us practice and listen to my new stuff and give me really good notes on it all. And there was a calmness to her that… nobody else had. It felt like when I was with her, I knew everything would be fine. It was like I was following the North Star".

"DAISY: I had absolutely no interest in being somebody else’s muse.
I am not a muse.
I am the somebody.
End of fucking story".

> La aventura de las gafas de oro
"Estas son mis últimas palabras. Aquí está el paquete que salvará a Alexis. Lo confio a su honor y sentido de la justicia. Ahora que ya he cumplido con mi deber, yo...
–¡Quieta! –gritó Holmes, atravesando la habitación de un salto y arrebatándole de la mano un frasquito.
–Demasiado tarde– dijo ella–. Tomé el veneno antes de salir del escondite. Confio en usted, señor Holmes".

"The camera pulls back slowly as they carry me away, for the first time revealing the arena as a whole. It looks like a giant eye. Well, the symbolism has been lost on no one. Even the little kid in the Seam know the Capitol powers are watching us. I wonder if the ever consider that we're watching them, too".

"And then she's gone to wherever people go when they die. She hasn't begged or pleaded; she retained her fury and defiance. Although for me, a person's desperation at the end is not a measure of their life, I know it mattered to her. Maysilee leaves the world the way she wanted, wounded but not bowed. I think about cleaning her up, but this is her final poster, and I won't tidy it up to make it easier for them".