Ciaran Carson Quotes

I am reminded, now, of Leonardo's advice to painters: You should fix your eyes, he says, on certain walls stained with damp. You will see in these the likenesses of divine landscapes, adorned with mountains, ruins, rocks, extensive plains; and you will see there battles and strange figures engaged in violent actions. For in such walls the same thing happens as in the sound of church bells, in whose reverberations you may find every word imaginable.

I am alone against hordes I cannot stop nor let go I stand here in the long cold hours alone against every foe.

I think a writer should always be surprised; and the more I write, the more it seems that the language itself, when explored with humility, is always deeper and more accurate than what the author thought he had in mind.

[Cu Chulainn will] spill the blood of everybody in the fort unless you act quickly and send the naked women out to meet him." ... "Bring on the naked women!" said Conchobar.

Almost dead yesterday, maybe dead tomorrow, but alive, gloriously alive, today.