Swann S Way Quotes

I would ask myself what o'clock it could be; I could hear the whistling of trains, which, now nearer and now farther off, punctuating the distance like the note of a bird in a forest, shewed me in perspective the deserted countryside through which a traveller would be hurrying towards the nearest station: the path that he followed being fixed for ever in his memory by the general excitement due to being in a strange place, to doing unusual things, to the last words of conversation, to farewells exchanged beneath an unfamiliar lamp which echoed still in his ears amid the silence of the night; and to the delightful prospect of being once again at home. ~ Marcel Proust

This compulsion to an activity without respite, without variety, without result was so cruel that one day, noticing a swelling over his stomach, he felt an actual joy in the idea that he had, perhaps, a tumor that would prove fatal, that he need not concern himself with anything further, since it was this malady that was going to govern his life, to make a plaything of him, until the not-distant end. If indeed, at his period, it often happened that, though without admitting it even to himself, he longed for death, it was in order to escape not so much from the keenness of his sufferings as from the monotony of his struggle. ~ Marcel Proust

I have friends wherever there are companies of trees, wounded but not vanquished, which huddle together with touching obstinancy to implore an inclement and pitiless sky. ~ Marcel Proust

These new words were heard by my love; they persuaded it that the next day would not be different from what all the other days had been; that Gilberte's feeling for me, already too old to be able to change, was indifference; that in my friendship with Gilberte, I was the only one who loved. "It's true," my love answered, "there's nothing more to be done with this friendship, it won't change." And so, the very next day (or waiting for a public holiday if there was one coming up soon, or an anniversary, or the New Year perhaps, one of those days which are not like the others, when time makes a fresh start by rejecting the heritage of the past, by not accepting the legacy of its sorrows) I would ask Gilberte to give up our old friendship and lay the foundations of a new one. ~ Marcel Proust

Recalling, some time later, what I had felt at the time, I distinguished the impression of having been held for a moment in her mouth, myself, naked, without any of the social attributes which belonged equally to her other playmates and, when she used my surname, to my parents, accessories of which her lips - by the effort she made, a little after her father's manner, to articulate the words to which she wished to give a special emphasis - had the air of stripping, of divesting me, like the skin from a fruit of which one can swallow only the pulp, while her glance, adapting itself to the same new degree of intimacy as her speech, fell on me also more directly and testified to the consciousness, the pleasure, even the gratitude that it felt by accompanying itself with a smile. ~ Marcel Proust

Carried away in a sort of dream, he smiled, then he began to hurry back towards the lady; he was walking faster than usual, and his shoulders swayed backwards and forwards, right and left, in the most absurd fashion; altogether he looked, so utterly had he abandoned himself to it, ignoring all other considerations, as though he were the lifeless and wire-pulled puppet of his own happiness. ~ Marcel Proust

One felt that in her renunciation of life she had deliberately abandoned those places in which she might at least have been able to see the man she loved, for others where he had never trod. ~ Marcel Proust

To think that I wasted years of my life, that I wanted to die, that I felt my deepest love, for a woman who did not appeal to me, who was not my type! ~ Marcel Proust

It's not a house to us. It's a home. And it's not a home, it's s way of life. Our summertime happens here. This house is part of our past, it's our present, it'll be our future. It's who we are. ~ Elin Hilderbrand

I believe it's our loss of connection with our instinctual side that prevents us from being effective pack leaders for our dogs. Perhaps it's also why we also seem to be failing at being positive guardians of our planet. ~ Cesar Millan

Always using the same methods is not God's way ~ Sunday Adelaja

I don't know where I'm going on this path. I don't know what I'm doing with my life. You had to be lost, before you could be found. These are the truths. You had to be confused, before you could find clarity; you had to suffer, before you could find peace. These were the only ways, life could happen. Of course you were confused before you found clarity. If you weren't confused, then you would already be clear. Of course you were lost before you were found. If you were already found, then you wouldn't be lost. Of course there would be suffering before peace. If there was already peace, then there wouldn't be suffering. One necessarily came before the other. ~ T. Scott McLeod

Your destiny is in your mind, just faith it and have a brighter destination. ~ Oladosu Feyikogbon

God does not permit persecution to arise without sufficient reason...He was leading us by a way that we knew not; but it was none the less His way. ~ Hudson Taylor

I'll join you, sir. You'll need help finding your way about the estate."
His lips tightened into a disapproving line. "Begging your pardon, Lady Rosalind, but I didn't have a nursemaid when I was three, so I certainly don't need one now. I'm perfectly capable of navigating an estate alone."
"I'm sure you are - indeed, you demonstrated a remarkable proficiency for it last night, and in a strange house, too. ~ Sabrina Jeffries

But there was a special kind of gift that came with embracing the chaos, even if I cursed most of the way. I'm convinced that, when everything is wiped blank, it's life 's way of forcing you to become acquainted with and aware of who you are now, who you can become. What is the fulfillment of your soul? ~ Jennifer DeLucy

Fear not the road before you,
The broken stones, the empty trees,
Mother will protect her child,
Wherever that roads leads.

Fear not the bear, the troll, the wolf,
Or other evil things,
Mother will protect her child,
No matter what the darkness brings.

Fear not the cloak of slumber,
When the sky has lost its sun,
Mother will protect her child,
Should any nightmares come... ~ S.A. Swann

Satisfaction of one's curiosity is one of the greatest sources of happiness in life.
Linus Pauling ~ Linus Pauling

If you look at another
woman, I'll rip your eyes out. Touch one and I'll cut off your hands. Kiss
her and I'll sever your tongue from your mouth.
"You don't want to know what I'll do if I find out your dick got
anywhere near another woman. So the choice is yours, you can live life as a
blind, mute eunuch with stubs at the end of your arms or you can close the
club... ~ Jenny Penn

Olivia watched him through a blur of tears, despising the futility of it. For there was nothing she could say to comfort a man whose family was long dead; there was no balm to heal wounds that scored a man's soul; and there was no way to make a man believe in the ties that bind. ~ Laura Lee Guhrke

Sometimes it seems to me that God 's way of dealing with me is not to let me see much of my friends, those who are most to me in the spiritual life, lest I should forget that the invisible bond is the only reality. That is the only way I can reconcile myself to the inevitable separations of life and death. ~ Lucy Larcom

All battles are fought by scared men who'd rather be some place else. ~ John Wayne

Kris," Leonard Scott looked at her from across the table, "we are hiring a group of people who will take part in helping the U.S. achieve the most radical change it has ever seen. This is not just change you can believe in, it's change you can touch and see and feel. We are ready to make you a part of this team, if you are ready to join us. ~ Alexandra Swann

Neamh," he murmered. '"Tis Neamh, you are, Olivia. ~ Laura Lee Guhrke

The nature of consciousness is to define what it calls reality. It's all of your observations that combine to form what it is you think reality is. God plays dice with the universe, and you be the dice, man. ~ S. Andrew Swann

As though one's life were a series of galleries in which all the portraits of any one period had a marked family likeness, the same (so to speak) tonality - this early Swann abounding in leisure, fragrant with the scent of the great chestnut-tree, of baskets of raspberries and of a sprig of tarragon. ~ Marcel Proust

this early Swann in whom I can distinguish the charming mistakes of my childhood, and who, incidentally, is less like his successor than he is like the other people I knew at that time, as though one's life were a series of galleries in which all the portraits of any one period had a marked family likeness, the same (so to speak) tonality ~ Marcel Proust

No, little one, George's ghost won't come back. Human beings don't have souls. No soul, no ghost. Simple."
"How can you say that?" protested Mopple. "We don't know whether humans have souls or not."
"Every lamb knows that your soul is in your sense of smell. And human beings don't have very good noses." Maude herself had an excellent sense of smell, and often thought about the problem of souls and noses.
"So you'd only see a very small ghost. Nothing to be afraid of. ~ Leonie Swann

Justice!" bleated Othello.
"Justice!" bleated the other sheep. And so it was decided that George Glenn's sheep themselves would solve the wicked murder of their shepherd. ~ Leonie Swann

Her mind returned to Dr. Chaturvedi's testimony. He had turned to Christianity because he had discovered that he was not special. He seemed happy enough, but was he really happy? Was Christianity just a club for people who had managed to lose their specialness? Was it a last resort for people when they realized that their dreams were not going to come true? Did they embrace Christianity because they could use their "faith" as an excuse for their failure? They could pretend that their Christian convictions were all that was standing between them and success, and they could declare that they would be on top of the world if they had not chosen to willingly give it all up to follow Jesus. ~ Joyce Swann

Seek comfort in the warmth of the morality of your choosing. Not in the depravity and fear of lost causes, in which you should turn away, before it sees you, as well.

- Plight, 2015 ~ Don Swann II

Maple thought optimistically that human beings, on their good days, weren't much dimmer than sheep. Or at least, not much dimmer than dim sheep. ~ Leonie Swann

I knew that the tears of adults were wetter, saltier, and much, much sadder than those of a child ~ Thomas Burnett Swann

...she grasped the terrible truth that love can never be compelled, from man, from sprite, from beast; that one who loves, however she longs for requital, however long she waits, may receive in return the reverse of what she gives, the dark side of the moon. ~ Thomas Burnett Swann

We talk about freedoms for African-Americans but unless you have more than one option politically, how free are you? ~ Lynn Swann

Then his jealousy rejoiced at the discovery, as though that jealousy had had an independent existence, fiercely egotistical, gluttonous of every thing that would feed its vitality, even at the expense of Swann himself. ~ Marcel Proust

I was not a very good football player when I started out. ~ Lynn Swann

Even Proust - there's a famous passage where Odette opens the door with a cold, she's sulky, her hair is loose and undone, her skin is patchy, and Swann, who has never cared about her until that moment, falls in love with her because she looks like a Botticelli girl from a slightly damaged fresco. Which Proust himself only knew from a reproduction. He never saw the original, in the Sistine Chapel. But even so - the whole novel is in some ways about that moment. And the damage is part of the attraction, the painting's blotchy cheeks. Even through a copy Proust was able to re-dream that image, re-shape reality with it, pull something all his own from it into the world. Because - the line of beauty is the line of beauty. It doesn't matter if it's been through the Xerox machine a hundred times. ~ Donna Tartt

Like many other men, Swann had a naturally lazy mind and lacked imagination. He knew perfectly well as a general truth that human life is full of contrasts, but in the case of each individual human being he imagined all that part of his or her life with which he was not familiar as being identical with the part with which he was. He imagined what was kept secret from him in the light of what was revealed. ~ Marcel Proust

As Angelica opened up her eyes, she shuddered in fear at the massive animal that was holding her and fondling her body. I have been captured by a Bigfoot, she thought. The natives were right. There are Bigfoots in the jungles of Elysia. Her body stiffened as she tried to twist away and out of the imprisoning arms of the massive creature that was holding her capture. ~ Bella Swann

She poured out Swann's tea, inquired "Lemon or cream?" and, on his answering "Cream, please," said to him with a laugh: "A cloud!" And as he pronounced it excellent, "You see, I know just how you like it." This tea had indeed seemed to Swann, just as it seemed to her; something precious, and love has such a need to find some justification for itself, some guarantee of duration, in pleasures which without it would have no existence and must cease with its passing. ~ Marcel Proust

Love can be a hell of a draw, the emotional holy grail. But love also exposes our flaws, can even draw out the worst in us. People want to perform heroic deeds, commit flagrantly dramatic acts for love. What they don't realize is that the daily grind is what is required. Instead of a single extraordinary act--slaying the dragon, throwing yourself in front of a bus--it is the repetition of small gestures over a course of years that makes love work. ~ Christopher Swann

I feel like there should be more black head coaches. ~ Lynn Swann

As James entered the El Paso city limits, he began thinking about lyrics to a song that would describe his journey. "I'm just cruise'n in my ride, with my posse by my side." Well, he didn't have anyone by his side - not even that dumb loser Grady, but that was hardly the point. This song would be his legacy, and he wanted to get it right. It would embody the contempt that he felt for society with all its rules and restrictions. It would make him into a folk hero. He would not pretend to die for any "cause." He would let the world know that he had preferred a watery death to an existence where he was bound by mindless regulations. ~ Joyce Swann

In Swann's mind, however, these words, meeting no opposition, settled and hardened until they assumed the indestructibility of a truth so indubitable that, if some friend happened to tell him that he had come by the same train and had not seen Odette, Swann would have been convinced that it was his friend who had made a mistake as to the day or hour, since his version did not agree with the words uttered by Odette. These words had never appeared to him false except when, before hearing them, he had suspected that they were going to be. For him to believe that she was lying, and anticipatory suspicion was indispensable. ~ Marcel Proust

The sea looked as if it had been licked clean, blue and clear and smooth, and there were a few woolly little clouds in the sky. Legend said that these clouds were sheep who had simply wandered over the cliff tops one day, special sheep who now went on grazing in the sky and were never shorn. In any case, they were a good sign. ~ Leonie Swann

We've had fifteen years of being grown-ups when we could have got together and we never have. Doesn't that tell you something?'
'Yeah, that timing is everything. Hit on me again now. ~ Karina Bliss

An hour or so later he received a note from Odette. Swann had left his cigarette case at her house. "If only," she wrote, "you had also forgotten your heart! I should never have let you have it back. ~ Marcel Proust