Death Masks Quotes

The next time I opened my eyes, I was in the morgue.
This, all by itself, is enough to really ruin your day.
I was lying on the examining table, and Butters, complete with his surgical gown and his tray of autopsy instruments, stood over me.
'I'm not dead!' I sputtered. 'I'm not dead!'
- Harry Dresden, Death Masks, Jim Butcher ~ Jim Butcher

Photography is an imprint or transfer off the real; it is a photochemically processed trace causally connected to the thing in the world to which it refers in a manner parallel to fingerprints or footprints or the rings of water that cold glasses leave on tables. The photograph is thus generically distinct from painting or sculpture or drawing. On the family tree of images it is closer to palm prints, death masks, the Shroud of Turin, or the tracks of gulls on beaches. ~ Rosalind E. Krauss

You suck. You suck diseased moose wang, Marcone. ~ Jim Butcher

Harvey wasn't interested in the clothes, it was the masks that mesmerized him. They were like snowflakes: no two alike. Some were made of wood and of plastic; some of straw and cloth and papier-mâché. Some were as bright as parrots, others as pale as parchment. Some were so grotesque he was certain they'd been carved by crazy people; others so perfect they looked like the death masks of angels. There were masks of clowns and foxes, masks like skulls decorated with real teeth, and one with carved flames instead of hair. ~ Clive Barker

Clean your face," I said to the child. "It's dirty." "It's not," the child said. "By God it is," I said, "filth adheres in ine areas which I shall enumerate." "That is because of the dough," the child said. "We were taking death masks." "Dough!" I exclaimed, shocked at the idea that the child had wasted flour and water and no doubt paper too in this lightsome pastime, taking death masks. "Death!" I exclaimed for added emphasis. "What do you know of death?" "It is the end of the world," the child said, "for the death-visited individual. The world ends," the child said, "when you turn out your eyes." This was true, I could not dispute it. I returned to the main point. "Your father is telling you to wash your face," I said, locating myself in the abstract where I was more comfortable. ~ Donald Barthelme

Mainspring of Life (A Sonnet)

I have no nationality except humanity,
I have no tradition except compassion,
I have no religion except liberty,
I have no god except a family of 7 billion,
I have no belief but only awareness,
I have no creed but only acceptance,
I have no messiah except the self,
I have no scripture except my conscience,
I have no gospel except godliness,
I have no sermon except thought,
I have no philosophy except oneness,
I have nothing to give you except love a whole lot,
I demand no obedience, nor do I desire worship and offering,
For there is death in worship, and freedom is life's mainspring. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Her eyes narrowing, she turned her attention back to where Stephanie stood with Ben, feeling her own pain turn to intense fury. "Dominic knew her so damn well because he was usually thinking the same thing. She was his female version – two halves fitting perfectly together," Gena spat out, anger inflected in her voice. "Like him, she's reckless and like him, once she gets something into her head nothing or no one will change her mind." Her fury revealed itself in her eyes, as she spat out, "And, like him, she's going to get herself killed." - Gena Evans, Nowhere to Run ~ Nina D'Angelo

The Catholic struggle to hold the line against Protestantism brought thirty years of misery to millions of Europeans: opinions vary, but within the German lands one modern estimate is that 40 per cent of the population met an early death through the fighting or the accompanying famine and disease, and even the most cautious reassessment of the evidence comes up with a figure of 15-20 per cent. ~ Diarmaid MacCulloch

I want to be taken playfully, not seriously - not with a long British face, but with beautiful laughter. Your laughter, your playfulness is the recognition that you have understood me. Your seriousness shows that you have misunderstood me, you have missed it - because seriousness is nothing but sickness. It is another name of sadness; it is a shadow of death. And I am all for life. If it is needed for your laughter, your dance, even to reject me, then reject me - but don't reject the dance and the song and the life, because that is my teaching. ~ Rajneesh

Good evening peepers, prowlers, pederasts, panty-sniffers, punks and pimps. I'm James Ellroy, the demon dog, the foul owl with the death growl, the white knight of the far right, and the slick trick with the donkey dick. I'm the author of 16 books, masterpieces all; they precede all my future masterpieces. These books will leave you reamed, steamed and drycleaned, tie-dyed, swept to the side, true-blued, tattooed and bah fongooed. These are books for the whole fuckin' family, if the name of your family is Manson. ~ James Ellroy

We can be reluctant to recognize how much of our culture was literary, particularly now that so many of the institutional purveyors of literature happily have joined in proclaiming its death. A substantial number of Americans who believe they worship God actually worship three major literary characters: the Yahweh of the J Writer (earliest author of Genesis, Exodus, Numbers), the Jesus of the Gospel of Mark, and Allah of the Koran. ~ Harold Bloom

It is hard doctrine, but I was beginning to understand it then, and I have not repudiated it till now: that love, not sin, costs us Eden. Love is a carrier of death - the only thing, in fact, that makes death significant. ~ Wallace Stegner

As crime writers, we put these characters, year after year, book after book, through the most horrendous trauma, dealing with grief and death and loss and violence. We can't pretend that these things don't affect these characters; they have to. If they don't, then you're essentially writing cartoons. ~ Mark Billingham

I wanted something that would address the strengths and weaknesses of humanity. I wanted a story that could move readers. My Honor Flight is that story. ~ Dan McCurrigan

The fountain of my heart dried up within me,
With nought that loved me, and with nought to love,
I stood upon the desert earth alone.
And in that deep and utter agony,
Though then, then even most unfit to die
I fell upon my knees and prayed for death. ~ Charles Robert Maturin

Instead of hating, my heart cries mercy! Mercy on me! Mercy on me! Mercy on me! ~ Phindiwe Nkosi

The act of abortion positions women at their most powerful, and that is why it is so strongly opposed by many in society. Historically viewed as and conditioned to be passive, dependent creatures, victims of biological circumstance, women often find it difficult to embrace this power over life and death. They fall prey to the assumption, the myth, that they cannot be trusted with it. ~ Merle Hoffman

He was repelled by the pettiness that reduced life to mere existence and that turned men into half-men. He wanted to lay his life on a balance, the other side of which was weighted with death. He wanted to make his every action, every day, yes, every hour and minute worthy of being measured against the ultimate, which is death. ~ Milan Kundera

We all create an outward self with which to face the world, and some people come to believe that is what they truly are. So they people the world with doctors who are nothing outside of the consulting-room, and judges who are nothing when they are not in court, and business men who wither with boredom when they have to retire from business, and teachers who are forever teaching. That is why they are such poor specimens when they are caught without their masks on. They have lived chiefly through the Persona. ~ Robertson Davies

To die with glory, if one has to die at all, is still, I think, pain for the dier. ~ Euripides

Four inches
The difference between life and death for you tonight was four inches. ~ Tiffany Snow

The mind will not believe in death, perhaps because, as far as the mind is concerned, death never happens. ~ Jeanette Winterson

There is nothing in biology yet found that indicates the inevitability of death. This suggests to me that it is not at all inevitable and that it is only a matter of time before biologists discover what it is that is causing us the trouble. ~ Richard P. Feynman

It's as if I have just solved Skivver's predictive equations, or even better, as if I have intuited the One Equation, seen the numbers behind the moon and the stars, behind mountains and history, art and death and yearning, as if my comprehension is large enough that it can encompass universes, from the beginning to the end of time. ~ Rachel Hartman

Have patience and be faithful unto death. Do not fight among yourselves. Be perfectly pure in money dealings ... We will do great things yet ... So long as you have faith and honesty and devotion, everything will prosper. ~ Swami Vivekananda

The effects of loss are acute, and unique to each individual. Not everyone mourns in the same way, but everyone mourns. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

The calla lilies are in bloom again. Such a strange flower - suitable to any occasion. I carried them on my wedding day, and now I place them here in memory of something that has died. ~ Katharine Hepburn

Unfortunately when I'm on my death bed I believe I'll be like most people and still looking for Jesus. And yes I've checked my sock drawer. ~ Stanley Victor Paskavich

The suffering and calamity are, moreover, exceptional. They befall a conspicuous person. They are themselves of some striking kind. They are also, as a rule, unexpected, and contrasted with previous happiness or glory. A tale, for example, of a man slowly worn to death by disease, poverty, little cares, sordid vices, petty persecutions, however piteous or dreadful it might be, would not be tragic in the Shakespearean sense. ~ A. C. Bradley

It is hard to lift up your own misfortune. To be at once the viewer and the viewed. To be both above and below. The one below is a spot, a shadow ... To consider your own person in the light of eternity (read: in the light of death). To rise into the air. The world from a bird's-eye view. ~ Danilo Kis

Death, after all, is the common expectation from birth. Neither heroes nor cowards can escape it. ~ Ellis Peters

It's equinox, with the world balanced between winter and summer, life and death, like a spinning ball balanced on the tip of someone's finger. ~ M.R. Carey

And I love Evander Holyfield to death! ~ Ray Lewis

The oblivion fear is something else, fear that I won't be able to give anything in exchange for my life. If you don't live a
life in service of a greater good, you've gotta at least die a death in service of a greater good, you know? And I fear that I won't get either a
life or a death that means anything. ~ John Green

If love is something you cherish, it is hard to glean much joy from death, even in one's enemies. ~ Russell Brand

How some dare scorn (as if a fabulous lie) that they should rise whom death to dust doth bind
and like to beasts, a beastly life they lead, who naught attend save death when they are dead. ~ William Alexander, 1st Earl Of Stirling

The fear of death has been raised too much and set up on high, especially by preachers, like the brazen serpent in the wilderness over the heads of the Israelites; but not with so good excuse as that symbol had, for this fear has not been curative, I think, nor made into pleasant or graceful shape, but rather a horrid spectacle, to affright people. For that men can be frightened into piety has been one of the legacies of religion which barbarous ages have bequeathed us plentifully. ~ James Vila Blake

Men use one another to assure their personal victory over death. ~ Ernest Becker

They both laughed and drank to each other; they had never tasted sweeter liquor in all their lives. And in that moment they fell so deeply in love that their hearts would never be divided. So the destiny of Tristram and Isolde was ordained. ~ Thomas Malory

So take that, death issues. ~ Tamara Summers

I wondered how many other things had flown past me into death. Perhaps many. Perhaps I was flying past them, like the grim reaper, signaling the end. This would explain so much. ~ Miranda July

There is no such thing as death. There is only life, life, and life alone - moving from one dimension to another. ~ Sadhguru

For a devotee death opens door for liberation but for a non-devotee death is end of everything. ~ Radhanath Swami

He who has rejected his demons badgers us to death with his angels ~ Henri Michaux

Nearly all of these successful folks have made it in the business world by sticking with the free market ideal of survival of the fittest over everything else. They believe in giving no quarter, and consequently they are antiunion, pro-death penalty, and pro-war- that is, until they actually feel the war's cost in their own wallets and a big voice coming out of the sky says: You could grab more money if we did not have this war to pay for! This is America, where greed is christened "drive" and is deemed a virtue. ~ Joe Bageant

I never think of death: I am too busy thinking of life. ~ David O. McKay

Morning or night, Friday or Sunday, made no difference, everything was the same: the gnawing, excruciating, incessant pain; that awareness of life irrevocably passing but not yet gone; that dreadful, loathsome death, the only reality, relentlessly closing in on him; and that same endless lie. What did days, weeks, or hours matter? ~ Leo Tolstoy

Immortality was something you paid for, and those you loved paid for, over and over again. There had been a precious few who had stayed with Magnus until death had parted them, but come death or a new stage of their lives where they felt he could not follow, they were all parted from him by something. ~ Cassandra Clare

Their souls - or maybe just our memories of them - belong to that place which even the dead can only dream of, the miraculous place from which our struggles and our dreams are born. A vastly complex and yet achingly simple place, built in eternal preservation of the very best of our natures. A place that's the finite distillation of the only journey that matters to both the heavens and the earth―the eternal journey to discover ourselves, a self that dies only to live young again within the ecstatic heartbeat of another. A miraculous place full of death, tragedy and despair, yet from which love is born eternal. ~ Michael Haley

He looked down through the green transparency to the stony bottom webbed with golden lines. Never still. If his soul could cast a reflection so briljant, and so intensely sweet, he might beg God to make such use of him. But that would be too childish. The actual sphere is not clear like this, but turbulent, angry. A vast human action is going on. Death watches. So if you have some happiness, conceal it. And when your heart is full, keep your mouth shut also. ~ Saul Bellow

At present sinners banish the remembrance and thought of death, and thus seek for peace (although they never find it) by leading a life of sin; but when they shall be in the agonies of death, about to enter into eternity, "when distress cometh upon them, they will seek for peace, and there will be none," then can they no longer fly from their evil conscience; they will seek peace, but what peace can be found by a soul laden with sins, which sting it like so many vipers? ~ Alfonso Maria De Liguori

He could sense the ridiculousness of life even as it tore the guts out of him. She saw that now. And death lay coiled in the dark between the perception and the pain. ~ Janet Fitch

Death moves about at random, without discriminating between the innocent and the evil, the poor and the rich. The only difference is that the poor usually handle it better. ~ Ruskin Bond

Let death find us as we are building up our matchstick protests against its waves. ~ Alain De Botton