Северный свет

Вот и мисс Уилкокс однажды сказала, что книги опасней любого оружия. Но, наверное, это только когда они попадают в нужные руки. В руках Клары Симмс книга может быть опасной, разве что если Клара даст ею кому-нибудь по голове.

Люди любят счастливые концы. И не любят потрясений.

За знание приходится чертовски дорого платить.

Слова имеют огромную силу.

Это не гордыня. Это другой грех.
Хуже всех остальных - яростных, раскаленных, стремительных. Этот грех сидит внутри тебя тихо, поедает изнутри, как трихины - свинью. Восьмой смертный грех. Тот, о котором Господь не упомянул.
Надежда.

Я улыбнулась, думая, что с секретностью она явно перегибает палку.

• Да ладно вам, мисс Уилкокс, это же не оружие, - сказала я.
• Верно, Мэтти, это книги. И они в сто раз опаснее оружия.

Well, it seems to me that there are books that tell stories, and then there are books that tell truths... The first kind, they show you life like you want it to be. With villains getting what they deserve and the hero seeing what a fool he's been and marrying the heroine and happy endings and all that... But the second kind, they show you life more like it is... The first kind makes you cheerful and contented, but the second kind shakes you up.

Sometimes, when you catch someone unaware at just the right time and in just the right light, you can catch sight of what they will be.

What I saw next stopped me dead in my tracks. Books. Not just one or two dozen, but hundreds of them. In crates. In piles on the floor. In bookcases that stretched from floor to ceiling and lined the entire room. I turned around and around in a slow circle, feeling as if I'd just stumbled into Ali Baba's cave. I was breathless, close to tears, and positively dizzy with greed.

We must have a good, working acquaintance with the classics if we are to understand the works that follow them and progress in our own literary endeavors. Understanding literature is like building a house, you don't build the third story first, you start with a foundation...

I listened as the words became sentences and the sentences became pages and the pages became feelings and voices and places and people.

Isn't that just perfect? A new word. Bright with possibilities. A flawless pearl to turn over and over in my head, then put away for safekeeping.

What did I know? Only that knowledge carries a damned high price.