“
Toska - noun /ˈtō-skə/ - Russian word roughly translated as sadness, melancholia, lugubriousness.
"No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.
”
”
Vladimir Nabokov
“
About time, what I really learned from studying English is: time is different with timing.
I understand the difference of these two words so well. I understand falling in love with the right person in the wrong timing could be the greatest sadness in a person's entire life.
”
”
Xiaolu Guo (A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers)
“
We were talking the other evening about the phrases one uses when trying to comfort someone who is in distress. I told him that in English we sometimes say, 'I've been there.' This was unclear to him at first-I've been where? But I explained that deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific loacation, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope.
'So sadness is a place?' Giovanni asked.
'Sometimes people live there for years,' I said.
”
”
Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)
“
In China, we say: 'There are many dreams in a long night.' It has been a long night, but I don't know if I want to continue the dreams. It feels like I am walking on a little path, both sides are dark mountains and valleys. I am walking towards a little light in the distance. Walking, and walking, I am seeing that light diminishing. I am seeing myself walk towards the end of the love, the sad end.
I love you more than I loved you before. I love you more than I should love you. But I must leave. I am losing myself. It is painful that I can't see myself. It is time for me to say those words you kept telling me recently. 'Yes, I agree with you. We can't be together.
”
”
Xiaolu Guo (A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers)
“
Farewell Sadness
Hello Sadness
You are inscribed in the lines on the ceiling
You are inscribed in the eyes that I love
You are not poverty absolutely
Since the poorest of lips denounce you
Ah with a smile
Bonjour Tristesse
Love of kind bodies
Power of love
From which kindness rises
Like a bodiless monster
Unattached head
Sadness beautiful face.
”
”
Paul Éluard (Selected Poems (A Calderbook, Cb435) (English and French Edition))
“
I love Evensong. There's something sad and essentially English about it.
”
”
Barbara Pym (Jane and Prudence)
“
Rhys absorbed that with chagrin. "No one has ever accused me of being a romantic," he said ruefully.
"If you were, how would you propose?"
He thought for a moment. "I would begin by teaching you a Welsh word. Hiraeth There's no equivalent in English."
"Hiraeth," she repeated, trying to pronounce it with a tapped R, as he had.
"Aye. It's a longing for something that was lost, or never existed. You feel it for a person or a place, or a time in your life...it's a sadness of the soul. Hiraeth calls to a Welshman even when he's closest to happiness, reminding him that he's incomplete."
Her brow knit with concern. "Do you feel that way?"
"Since the day I was born." He looked down into her small, lovely face. "But not when I'm with you. That's why I want to marry you.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels, #2))
“
Adieu Tristesse
Bonjour Tristesse
Farewell Sadness
Hello Sadness
You are inscribed in the lines on the ceiling
You are inscribed in the eyes that I love
You are not poverty absolutely
Since the poorest of lips denounce you
Ah with a smile
Bonjour Tristesse
Love of kind bodies
Power of love
From which kindness rises
Like a bodiless monster
Unattached head
Sadness beautiful face.
”
”
Paul Éluard (Selected Poems (A Calderbook, Cb435) (English and French Edition))
“
An old walrus-faced waiter attended to me; he had the knack of pouring the coffee and the hot milk from two jugs, held high in the air, and I found this entrancing, as if he were a child's magician. One day he said to me - he had some English - "Why are you sad?"
"I'm not sad," I said, and began to cry. Sympathy from strangers can be ruinous.
"You should not be sad," he said, gazing at me with his melancholy, leathery walrus eyes. "It must be the love. But you are young and pretty, you will have time to be sad later." The French are connoisseurs of sadness, they know all the kinds. This is why they have bidets. "It is criminal, the love," he said, patting my shoulder. "But none is worse.
”
”
Margaret Atwood (The Blind Assassin)
“
The Greek word for "return" is nostos. Algos means "suffering." So nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return. To express that fundamental notion most Europeans can utilize a word derived from the Greek (nostalgia, nostalgie) as well as other words with roots in their national languages: añoranza, say the Spaniards; saudade, say the Portuguese. In each language these words have a different semantic nuance. Often they mean only the sadness caused by the impossibility of returning to one's country: a longing for country, for home. What in English is called "homesickness." Or in German: Heimweh. In Dutch: heimwee. But this reduces that great notion to just its spatial element. One of the oldest European languages, Icelandic (like English) makes a distinction between two terms: söknuour: nostalgia in its general sense; and heimprá: longing for the homeland. Czechs have the Greek-derived nostalgie as well as their own noun, stesk, and their own verb; the most moving, Czech expression of love: styska se mi po tobe ("I yearn for you," "I'm nostalgic for you"; "I cannot bear the pain of your absence"). In Spanish añoranza comes from the verb añorar (to feel nostalgia), which comes from the Catalan enyorar, itself derived from the Latin word ignorare (to be unaware of, not know, not experience; to lack or miss), In that etymological light nostalgia seems something like the pain of ignorance, of not knowing. You are far away, and I don't know what has become of you. My country is far away, and I don't know what is happening there. Certain languages have problems with nostalgia: the French can only express it by the noun from the Greek root, and have no verb for it; they can say Je m'ennuie de toi (I miss you), but the word s'ennuyer is weak, cold -- anyhow too light for so grave a feeling. The Germans rarely use the Greek-derived term Nostalgie, and tend to say Sehnsucht in speaking of the desire for an absent thing. But Sehnsucht can refer both to something that has existed and to something that has never existed (a new adventure), and therefore it does not necessarily imply the nostos idea; to include in Sehnsucht the obsession with returning would require adding a complementary phrase: Sehnsucht nach der Vergangenheit, nach der verlorenen Kindheit, nach der ersten Liebe (longing for the past, for lost childhood, for a first love).
”
”
Milan Kundera (Ignorance)
“
Hiraeth,” she repeated, trying to pronounce it with a tapped R, as he had.
“Aye. There's no equivalent in English. It's a longing for something that was lost, or never existed. You feel it for a person or a place, or a time in your life... it's a sadness of the soul. Hiraeth calls to a Welshman even when he's closest to happiness, reminding him that he's incomplete.”
Her brow knit with concern. “Do you feel that way?”
“Since the day I was born. But not when I'm with you. That's why I want to marry you.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels, #2))
“
Do you know, when I am with you I am not afraid at all. It is a magic altogether curious that happens inside the heart. I wish I could take it with me when I leave.
It is sad, my Grey. We are constrained by the rules of this Game we play. There is not one little place under those rules for me to be with you happily. Or apart happily, which is what makes it so unfair.
I have discovered a curious fact about myself. An hour ago I was sure you were dead, and it hurt very much. Now you are alive, and it is only that I must leave you, and I find that even more painful. That is not at all logical.
Do you know the Symposium, Grey? The Symposium of Plato. [He] says that lovers are like two parts of an egg that fit together perfectly. Each half is made for the other, the single match to it. We are incomplete alone. Together, we are whole. All men are seeking that other half of themselves. Do you remember?
I think you are the other half of me. It was a great mix-up in heaven. A scandal. For you there was meant to be a pretty English schoolgirl in the city of Bath and for me some fine Italian pastry cook in Palermo. But the cradles were switched somehow, and it all ended up like this…of an impossibility beyond words.
I wish I had never met you. And in all my life I will not forget lying beside you, body to body, and wanting you.
”
”
Joanna Bourne (The Spymaster's Lady (Spymasters, #1))
“
Memories do not change, and change is the law of existence. If our dead, the closest, the most beloved, were to return to us after a long absence and instead of the old, familiar trees were to find in our souls English gardens and stone walls -- that is to say, other loves, other tastes, other interests, they would gaze upon us sadly and tenderly for a moment, wiping away their tears, and then return to their tombs to rest.
”
”
Teresa de la Parra (Las memorias de Mamá Blanca)
“
As they ate and played, and talked and told jokes, as they fished and wrestled, as they walked in the woods practicing Tatiana’s English and swam naked across the river and back, as he helped her with their laundry and the laundry of four old women, as he carried the water from the well for her and her milk pails, as he brushed her hair each morning and made love to her many times a day, never tiring, never ceasing to be aroused by her, Alexander knew that he was living the happiest days of his life. He held no illusions. Lazarevo was not going to come again, neither for him nor for her. Tatiana held those illusions. And he thought—it was better to have them. Look at him. And look at her. Tatiana so ceaselessly and happily did for him, so constantly smiled and touched him and laughed—even as their twenty-nine moon-cycle days spun faster around the loop of grief—that Alexander had to wonder if she ever even thought about the future. He knew she sometimes thought about the past. He knew she thought about Leningrad. She had a stony sadness around her edges that she had not had before. But for the future, Tatiana seemed to harbor a rosy hope, or at the very least a sense of humming unconcern. What are you doing? she would ask him when he was sitting on the bench and smoking. Nothing, Alexander would reply. Nothing but growing my pain. He smoked and wished for her.
”
”
Paullina Simons (The Bronze Horseman (The Bronze Horseman, #1))
“
To Hope
Oh, Hope! thou soother sweet of human woes!
How shall I lure thee to my haunts forlorn!
For me wilt thou renew the wither’d rose,
And clear my painful path of pointed thorn?
Ah come, sweet nymph! in smiles and softness drest,
Like the young hours that lead the tender year,
Enchantress! come, and charm my cares to rest:—
Alas! the flatterer flies, and will not hear!
A prey to fear, anxiety, and pain,
Must I a sad existence still deplore?
Lo!—the flowers fade, but all the thorns remain,
'For me the vernal garland blooms no more.'
Come then, 'pale Misery’s love!' be thou my cure,
And I will bless thee, who, tho’ slow, art sure.
”
”
Charlotte Turner Smith (The Poems of Charlotte Smith (Women Writers in English 1350-1850))
“
You know… when you're so sad, it's lovely to see sunsets … — The day you saw it forty-four times, were you so very sad?" But the little prince made no reply.
”
”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Le Petit Prince - The Little Prince: Bilingue avec le texte parallèle - Bilingual parallel text: Français - Anglais / French - English (Dual Language Easy Reader Book 32))
“
There was something, I thought, very lovely in this habit of the French language which gives it an added grace, tenderness, nuance, sadly lacking in English, with its single use of "you".
”
”
Dorothy Strachey (Olivia)
“
when English rolled around. 'Romeo and Juliette' this term. Allow me to summarise: Love, cock-up, bad communication, sad ending; waste of time that could have been spent reading 'The Hobbit'.
”
”
H.D.A. Roberts (Shadowborn's Terror (The Magician's Brother, #4))
“
Albert Graeme
It was an English ladye bright,
(The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall)
And she would marry a Scottish knight,
For Love will still be lord of all.
Blithely they saw the rising sun
When he shone fair on Carlisle wall;
But they were sad ere day was done,
Though Love was still the lord of all.
Her sire gave brooch and jewel fine,
Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall;
Her brother gave but a flask of wine,
For ire that Love was lord of all.
For she had lands both meadow and lea,
Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,
For he swore her death, ere he would see
A Scottish knight the lord of all.
That wine she had not tasted well
(The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall)
When dead, in her true love's arms, she fell,
For Love was still the lord of all!
He pierced her brother to the heart,
Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,
So perish all would true love part
That Love may still be lord of all!
And then he took the cross divine,
Where the sun shines fair on Carlisle wall,
And died for her sake in Palestine;
So Love was still the lord of all.
Now all ye lovers, that faithful prove,
(The sun shines fair on Carlisle wall)
Pray for their souls who died for love,
For Love shall still be lord of all!
-- Canto 6
”
”
Walter Scott (The Lay of the Last Minstrel 1805 (Revolution and Romanticism, 1789-1834))
“
The cognate word xenos can mean both “stranger” and “friend”; it is the root from which we get the English word “xenophobia,” the fear of strangers or foreigners, as well as the sadly less common “xenophilia,” the love of strangers or of unknown objects.
”
”
Homer (The Odyssey)
“
You killed someone you were supposed to love and I killed someone I was supposed to love, and we both understand the pain and the fear and the sadness and the guilt and the hundred other feelings that don’t even have a name in all of the English language.
”
”
Annabel Pitcher
“
For the last year and a half this room had been my 'pensive citadel:' here I had read and studied through all the hours of the night: and, though true it was, that for the latter part of this time I, who was framed for love and gentle affections, had lost my gaiety and happiness, during the strife and fever of contention with my guardian; yet, on the other hand, as a boy, so passionately fond of books, and dedicated to intellectual pursuits, I could not fail to have enjoyed many happy hours in the midst of general dejection. I wept as I looked round on the chair, hearth, writing-table, and other familiar objects, knowing too certainly, that I looked upon them for the last time.
”
”
Thomas de Quincey (Confessions of an English Opium Eater)
“
Song
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget.
Sir Thomas Wyatt has been credited with introducing the Petrarchan sonnet into the English language. Wyatt's father had been one of Henry VII's Privy Councilors and remained a trusted adviser when Henry VIII came to the throne in 1509. Wyatt followed his father to court, but it seems the young poet may have fallen in love with the king’s mistress, Anne Boleyn. Their acquaintance is certain, although whether or not the two actually shared a romantic relationship remains unknown. But in his poetry, Wyatt called his mistress Anna and there do seem to be correspondences. For instance, this poem might well have been written about the King’s claim on Anne Boleyn:
”
”
Christina Rossetti
“
Today, I live in France. We have been made utterly welcome by our French neighbours, who, if the subject arises, can only scratch their heads in utter bemusement at why we would want to leave this union. I try to explain, but in order to really understand, you have to be British. Or rather, not British, but a certain English sort – that peculiar, insular, self-aggrandising mentality that cannot see past the White Cliffs of Kent. I have never understood that,
”
”
Frank Cottrell Boyce (A Love Letter to Europe: An outpouring of sadness and hope – Mary Beard, Shami Chakrabati, Sebastian Faulks, Neil Gaiman, Ruth Jones, J.K. Rowling, Sandi Toksvig and others)
“
Taking her left hand, he began to slide the moonstone onto her finger, and hesitated. "How did I propose the first time?" He had been nervous, steeling himself for a possible refusal; he could hardly remember a word he'd said.
Amusement tugged at her lips. "You laid out the advantages on both sides, and explained the ways in which our future goals were compatible."
Rhys absorbed that with chagrin. "No one has ever accused me of being a romantic," he said ruefully.
"If you were, how would you propose?"
He thought for a moment. "I would begin by teaching you a Welsh word. Hiraeth. There's no equivalent in English."
"Hiraeth," she repeated, trying to pronounce it with a tapped R, as he had.
"Aye. It's a longing for something that was lost, or never existed. You feel it for a person or a place, or a time in your life... it's a sadness of the soul. Hiraeth calls to a Welshman even when he's closest to happiness, reminding him that he's incomplete."
Her brow knit with concern. "Do you feel that way?"
"Since the day I was born." He looked down into her small, lovely face. "But not when I'm with you. That's why I want to marry you."
Helen smiled. She reached up to curl her hand around the back of his neck, her caress as light as silk gauze being pulled across his skin. Standing on her toes, she drew his head down and kissed him. Her lips were smoother than petals, all clinging silk and tender dampness. He had the sensation of surrendering, some terrible soft sweetness evading him and rearranging his insides.
Breaking the kiss, Helen lowered back to her heels. "Your proposals are improving," she told him, and extended her hand as he fumbled to slide the ring onto her finger.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (Marrying Winterborne (The Ravenels, #2))
“
After four or five months of reading Hemingway, I decided to write a story. I had in the past written stories for English classes. These had all been about white people, because white people’s stories seemed to matter more. Also, I hadn’t known how to write about Indians. How would I translate the various family relations, the difference between an uncle who is a father’s brother and an uncle who is a mother’s brother? Having read Hemingway, I knew that I should just push all the exotic things to the side as if they didn’t matter, that this was how one used exoticism—by not bothering to explain.
The first story I wrote was about my brother coughing. I woke one night to the sound of Birju coughing downstairs and then could not go back to sleep. To be woken this way and not be able to return to sleep struck me as sad enough to merit a reader’s attention. Also, Hemingway had written a story about a man being woken because somebody is dying nearby, and the man is forced to witness the death.
I got up from my bed and turned on the light. I then returned to bed with a spiral-bound notebook and placed it against my knees. I began my story in the middle of the action the way Hemingway did. I wrote:
The coughing wakes me. My wife coughs and coughs, and then when her throat is clear, she moans. The nurse’s aide moves back and forth downstairs. The hospital bed jingles.
I wrote that it was a spouse coughing because that seemed something a reader could identify with, while a brother would be too specific to me.
I lie here, listening to my wife cough, and it is hard to believe that she is dying.
It was strange to write something down and for that thing to come into existence. The fact that the sentence existed made Birju’s coughing somehow less awful.
As I sat on my bed, I thought about how I could end my story. I held my pencil above the sheet of paper. According to the essays I had read on Hemingway, all I needed to do was attach something to the end of the story that was both unexpected and natural.
I imagined Birju dying; this had to be what would eventually happen. As soon as I imagined this, I did not want him gone. I felt a surge of love for Birju. Even though he was sick and swollen, I did not want him gone. I wrote:
I lie in my bed and listen to her cough and am glad she is coughing because this means she is alive. Soon she will die, and I will no longer be among the lucky people whose wives are sick.
Fortunate are the men whose wives cough. Fortunate are the men who cannot sleep through the night because their wives’ coughing wakes them.
”
”
Akhil Sharma (Family Life)
“
Next week is Beltane,” she reminded him. “Do you suppose we will make it through the wedding this time?”
“Not if Gideon says you cannot get out of this bed,” he countered sternly.
“Absolutely not!” she burst out, making him wince and cover the ear she’d been too close to. She immediately regretted her thoughtlessness, making a sad sound before reaching to kiss the ear she had offended with quiet gentleness.
Jacob extricated himself from her hold enough to allow himself to turn and face her.
“Okay, explain what you meant,” he said gently.
“I refuse to wait another six months. We are getting married on Beltane, come hell or . . . necromancers . . . or . . . the creature from the Black Lagoon. There is no way Corrine is going to be allowed to get married without me getting married, too. I refuse to listen to her calling me the family hussy for the rest of the year.”
“What does it matter what she says?” Jacob sighed as he reached to touch the soft contours of her face. “You and I are bonded in a way that transcends marriage already. Is that not what is important?”
“No. What’s important is the fact that I am going to murder the sister I love if she doesn’t quit. And she will not quit until I shut her up either with a marriage or a murder weapon. Understand?”
Clearly, by his expression, Jacob did not understand.
“Thank Destiny all I have is a brother,” he said dryly. “I have been inundated with people tied into knots over one sister or another for the past weeks.”
“You mean Legna. Listen, it’s not her fault if everyone has their shorts in a twist because of who her Imprinted mate is! Frankly, I think she and Gideon make a fabulous couple. Granted, a little too gorgeously ‘King and Queen of the Prom’ perfect for human eyes to bear looking at for long, but fabulous just the same.”
Jacob blinked in confusion as he tried to decipher his fiancée’s statement. Even after all these months, she still came out with unique phraseologies that totally escaped his more classic comprehension of the English language. But he had gotten used to just shrugging his confusion off, blaming it on the fact that English wasn’t his first, second, or third language, so it was to be expected.
“Anyway,” she went on, “Noah and Hannah need to chill. You saw Legna when she came to visit yesterday. If a woman could glow, she was as good as radioactive.” She smiled sweetly at him. “That means,” she explained, “that she looks as brilliantly happy as you make me feel.”
“I see,” he chuckled. “Thank you for the translation.”
He reached his arms around her, drawing her body up to his as close as he could considering the small matter of a fetal obstacle. He kissed her inviting mouth until she was breathless and glowing herself.
“I thought I would be kind to you,” she explained with a laugh against his mouth.
“You, my love, are all heart.”
“And you are all pervert. Jacob!” She laughed as she swatted one of his hands away from intimate places, only to be shanghaied by another. “What would Gideon say?”
“He better not say anything, because if he did that would mean he was in here while you are naked. And that, little flower, would probably cost him his vocal chords in any event.”
“Oh. Well . . . when you put it that way . . .
”
”
Jacquelyn Frank (Gideon (Nightwalkers, #2))
“
The English language contains the words "poignant" and "bittersweet," but it is challenging to find other words to describe the complex emotional states we feel as we run out of time. Our inner experience is too complicated to label.
Without language to express the nuances, we often resort to using single words to describe complicated feelings, but emotions frequently occur in combinations, such as sorrow and rage, anger and fear, or love, sadness, and bitterness all at the same time. We do not usually feel this or that, but rather, both this and that and three or four other emotions as well.
”
”
Mary Pipher (Women Rowing North: Navigating Life’s Currents and Flourishing As We Age)
“
Tommorow Call
you call me that night when you were alone and crying,
but I am only an outcast,
and it all blast in my mind,
in my heart,
an ocean of tears falling
let me dream cause I feel so deprim,
don't wake me up I won't get up
cause I always chose to never give up,
but lately it all fall apart like a castle of card
let me go back to my fortress
cause its the only place I can be a mess without distress
and when love don't love you back
make some step back even
if you don't no where to go keep going
even if you don't know what you doing
cause you know you have a blessing
and never let go cause you never know
what can be made of tomorrow even when in a sorrow don't let it go
you never know what can be made of tomorrow
He was like a brother. He never showed it but he was broken and at some point he couldn't handle it anymore.
Whitout the strength to get out of this pain
Full of life i remember him crossing the door for the last time
He was sad inside
He was lost
He was my friend
He was my brother
Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to live
if I have time I would tell him that love and the time that goes by also makes mistakes
Now he's gone and people finally realize how amazing he was but now it's to late.
Maybe a little love and a hand to hold it wouldn't have come to this
But I had been the pillar and now the base is broke.
Walking in the street wearing masks of the lie, faded soul in disguise only an entity, invisible, intangible
never let go cause you never know
what can be made of tomorrow even when in a sorrow don't let it go
”
”
Marty Bisson milo
“
Perhaps I could help,” Marcus suggested pleasantly, stopping beside her. “If you would tell me what you’re looking for.”
“Something romantic. Something with a happy ending. There should always be a happy ending, shouldn’ there?”
Marcus reached out to finger a trailing lock of her hair, his thumb sliding along the glowing satin filaments. He had never thought of himself as a particularly tactile man, but it seemed impossible to keep from touching her when she was near. The pleasure he derived from the simplest contact with her set all his nerves alight. “Not always,” he said in reply to her question.
Lillian let out a bubbling laugh. “How very English of you. How you all love to suffer, with your stiff…stiff…” She peered at the book in her hands, distracted by the gilt on its cover. “…upper lips,” she finished absently.
“We don’t like to suffer.”
“Yes, you do. At the very least, you go out of your way to avoid enjoying something.”
By now Marcus was becoming accustomed to the unique mixture of lust and amusement that she always managed to arouse in him. “There’s nothing wrong with keeping one’s enjoyments private.”
Dropping the book in her hands, Lillian turned to face him. The abruptness of the movement resulted in a sharp wobble, and she swayed back against the shelves even as he moved to steady her with his hands at her waist. Her tip-tilted eyes sparkled like an array of diamonds scattered over brown velvet. “It has nothing to do with privacy,” she informed him. “The truth is that you don’t want to be happy, bec—” She hiccupped gently. “Because it would undermine your dignity. Poor Wes’cliff.”
She regarded him compassionately. At the moment, preserving his dignity was the last thing on Marcus’s mind. He grasped the frame of the bookcase on either side of her, encompassing her in the half circle of his arms. As he caught a whiff of her breath, he shook his head and murmured, “Little one…what have you been drinking?”
“Oh…” She ducked beneath his arm and careened to the sideboard a few feet away. “I’ll show you…wonderful, wonderful stuff…this.” Triumphantly she plucked a nearly empty brandy bottle from the edge of the sideboard and held it by the neck. “Look what someone did…a pear, right inside! Isn’ that clever?” Bringing the bottle close to her face, she squinted at the imprisoned fruit. “It wasn’ very good at first. But it improved after a while. I suppose it’s an ac”—another delicate hiccup— “acquired taste.”
“It appears you’ve succeeded in acquiring it,” Marcus remarked, following her.
“You won’ tell anyone, will you?”
“No,” he promised gravely. “But I’m afraid they’re going to know regardless. Unless we can sober you in the next two or three hours before they return. Lillian, my angel…how much was in the bottle when you started?”
Showing him the bottle, she put her finger a third of the way from the bottom. “It was there when I started. I think. Or maybe there.” She frowned sadly at the bottle. “Now all that’s left is the pear.” She swirled the bottle, making the plump fruit slosh juicily at the bottom. “I want to eat it,” she announced.
“It’s not meant to be eaten. It’s only there to infuse the—Lillian, give the damned thing to me.
”
”
Lisa Kleypas (It Happened One Autumn (Wallflowers, #2))
“
She presses play and Andrea listens to the song. A guitar starts playing, then another and then drums; it’s an unusual sound; it seems like rock music but is strange, somewhat gothic and punk. It’s a melodic song, though, and his foot taps the beat without him realizing. A man’s voice, full of sadness, sings the first words: "When routine bites hard And ambitions are low And resentment rides high But emotions won’t grow And we're changing our ways Taking different roads..." Andrea knows it! He hears the song arrive from his distant past with a suitcase full of memories. He sees himself as a child, sitting in the living room, his little legs dangling from a chair. His father has just received a new CD from abroad and couldn’t wait to receive it so Gina the caretaker has sent it on to him in Clusone. He’s really excited and tells mom all about it. She’s happy too. Barbara has pigtails and is eating a piece of focaccia with olives, sticking her fingers inside to take them out one by one. She’s tiny, five years old or maybe younger. Andrea sees the CD on the table and wonders what is so special about it. There's a very pale guy on the front, with dark hair and a strange fringe. His mouth is right up to the microphone and everything else is black. It’s written in a language that he can’t read, though he knows that it’s English. His parents are so happy that he decides to take it and have a listen. He snatches the disc and CD player and runs off. He runs very fast... "Then love, love will tear us apart again" sings Ian Curtis, the voice of Joy Division, his parents’ favorite band. It’s a compilation that came out in 2000, containing a special song, "Love will tear us apart again." Andrea runs to a little girl that he loves very much. He has fun all day long with her in the mountains. He runs to his inseparable friend, his dear... "Susy!" he exclaims, eyes open wide. She smiles and nods. He
”
”
Key Genius (Heart of flesh)
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Rakesh Roshan
Rakesh Roshan is a producer, director, and actor in Bollywood films. A member of the successful Roshan film family, Mr. Roshan opened his own production company in 1982 and has been producing Hindi movies ever since. His film Kaho Naa…Pyaar Hai won nine Filmfare awards, including those for best movie and best director.
When I remember Diana and her activities in the last years of her life, I strongly feel that God sends some special people into this world to perform some special duties. Diana was one of these special people. Advancing on this godly path of love and goodness, Diana was blossoming like a flower, and with her captivating fragrance she started infusing new life in our dangerously sick garden--which was apparently at the brink of a precipice. The irony is that the cruel winds of autumn ruthlessly blew away this rare flower and deprived the world of its soothing fragrance. Diana, Princess of Wales, is no longer present in this world, but Diana, the queen of millions of hearts, is immortal and will live forever.
My heart breaks when I think of her last journey, her funeral, which was brilliantly covered all over the world. One could see the whole of England in tears, and the eyes of all the television viewers were also flooded. Thousands of men, women, and children had lined up along the entire route from the palace to the church where the services were held. All the fresh flowers available in the United Kingdom were there on the passage. All eyes were tearful, and one could clearly hear the sobs of people. There were heartrending scenes of people paying tribute to their departed darling.
Last, I would like to write here a translation in English of a poem written in Urdu.
We hope you will come back…dear friend
But why this pervading sadness…dear friend
The familiar flavor in the atmosphere is singing…
You are somewhere around…dear friend
Please come back, Diana; this sinking world desperately needs a savior.
”
”
Larry King (The People's Princess: Cherished Memories of Diana, Princess of Wales, From Those Who Knew Her Best)
“
Would you like to talk about it?” This too was met with deafening silence. Because no matter how much Susannah might like to confide in her Aunt Julia, she just couldn’t. No one could understand how she felt, deep inside. It was too powerful, too unpronounceable, too unwieldy a thing, and if she said it out loud it would just explode like a cannon. “Well,” Julia said with a sigh. “Perhaps I can guess.” She paused to think, but only for a moment. “You are sad because Sebastian has left for his Grand Tour, and you are afraid he will go away and forget you and meet some other young woman. Perhaps she’s Parisian. Or Belgian. Those Belgian girls do have forthrightness that comes with being from such a small country. But regardless of the nationality of this young lady, she is sophisticated and fashionable and she’ll have Sebastian wrapped around her finger. And he’ll never see you as anything other than a little sister.” Susannah’s head came up. She stared at her aunt, her tear-stained cheeks flushed, but her eyes unblinking and suddenly quite dry. “By the time he comes back, your young Mr. Beckett will be married to said Belgian girl, who you will be forced to smile at and visit with at Custard House, even as your heart breaks with every love-coo she sends her henpecked Sebastian.” Susannah gaped. Her mind reeled at the exposure of her deepest, darkest fears. “That was the most terrible thing you could have possibly said,” she blurted out, slapping a hand over her mouth in horror. But Julia just smiled. “It’s also the most unlikely to happen. Good English boys don’t go on their Grand Tour and come back married.” “But… it could. Belgian girls, and all.” “True, but it doesn’t happen to good English boys who rely on their good English fathers for income, at least,” her aunt said wryly.
”
”
Anna Campbell (A Grosvenor Square Christmas)
“
Очи чёрные, очи страстные,
Очи жгучие и прекрасные!
Как люблю я вас, как боюсь я вас!
Знать, увидел вас я в недобрый час!
Ох, недаром вы глубины темней!
Вижу траур в вас по душе моей,
Вижу пламя в вас я победное:
Сожжено на нём сердце бедное.
Но не грустен я, не печален я,
Утешительна мне судьба моя:
Всё, что лучшего в жизни Бог дал нам,
В жертву отдал я огневым глазам!
English translation:
Black eyes, passionate eyes,
Burning and beautiful eyes!
How I love you, how I fear you,
It seems I met you in an unlucky hour!
Oh, not for nothing are you darker than the deep!
I see mourning for my soul in you,
I see a triumphant flame in you:
A poor heart immolated in it.
But I am not sad, I am not sorrowful,
My fate is soothing to me:
All that is best in life that God gave us,
In sacrifice I returned to the fiery eyes!
”
”
Yevhen Hrebinka
“
IV-132. Of Eden, where delicious Paradise, / Now nearer, Crowns with her enclosure green, / As with a rural mound the champain head IV-135. Of a steep wilderness, whose hairie sides / With thicket overgrown, grottesque and wilde, IV-137. Access deni'd; and over head up grew / Insuperable highth of loftiest shade, / Cedar, and Pine, and Firr, and branching Palm / A Silvan Scene, and as the ranks ascend / Shade above shade, a woodie Theatre IV-142. Of stateliest view. Yet higher then thir tops / The verdurous wall of paradise up sprung: IV-144. Which to our general Sire gave prospect large / Into his neather Empire neighbouring round. IV-146. And higher then that Wall a circling row / Of goodliest Trees loaden with fairest Fruit, / Blossoms and Fruits at once of golden hue / Appeerd, with gay enameld colours mixt: IV-150. On which the Sun more glad impress'd his beams / Then in fair Evening Cloud, or humid Bow, / When God hath showrd the earth; so lovely seemd IV-153. That Lantskip: And of pure now purer aire / Meets his approach, and to the heart inspires / Vernal delight and joy, able to drive / All sadness but despair: now gentle gales / Fanning thir odoriferous wings dispense IV-158. Native perfumes, and whisper whence they stole IV-159. Those balmie spoiles. As when to them who saile / Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past / Mozambic, off at Sea North-East windes blow / Sabean Odours from the spicie shoare / Of Arabie the blest, with such delay / Well pleas'd they slack thir course, and many a League / Chear'd with the grateful smell old Ocean smiles.
”
”
Joseph Lanzara (John Milton's Paradise Lost In Plain English)
“
The Hussar never does see his English Katherine again except in dreams and hopes and luxurious regret, and the child he dreams turns out to be a boy, not a girl, with flyaway hair.
”
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Emma Richler (Be My Wolff)
“
Great writers and my mom never used food as an object. Instead it was a medium, a catalyst to mend hearts, to break down barriers, to build relationships. Mom's cooking fed body and soul. She used to quip, "If the food is good, there's no need to talk about the weather." That was my mantra for years---food as meal and conversation, a total experience.
I leaned my forehead against the glass and thought again about Emma and the arrowroot. Mom had highlighted it in my sophomore English class. "Jane Fairfax knew it was given with a selfish heart. Emma didn't care about Jane, she just wanted to appear benevolent."
"That girl was stupid. She was poor and should've accepted the gift." The football team had hooted for their spokesman.
"That girl's name was Jane Fairfax, and motivation always matters." Mom's glare seared them.
I tried to remember the rest of the lesson, but couldn't. I think she assigned a paper, and the football team stopped chuckling.
Another memory flashed before my eyes. It was from that same spring; Mom was baking a cake to take to a neighbor who'd had a knee replacement.
"We don't have enough chocolate." I shut the cabinet door.
"We're making an orange cake, not chocolate."
"Chocolate is so much better."
"Then we're lucky it's not for you. Mrs. Conner is sad and she hurts and it's spring. The orange cake will not only show we care, it'll bring sunshine and spring to her dinner tonight. She needs that."
"It's just a cake."
"It's never just a cake, Lizzy."
I remembered the end of that lesson: I rolled my eyes----Mom loathed that----and received dish duty. But it turned out okay; the batter was excellent.
I shoved the movie reel of scenes from my head. They didn't fit in my world. Food was the object. Arrowroot was arrowroot. Cake was cake. And if it was made with artisan dark chocolate and vanilla harvested by unicorns, all the better. People would crave it, order it, and pay for it. Food wasn't a metaphor---it was the commodity---and to couch it in other terms was fatuous. The one who prepared it best won.
”
”
Katherine Reay (Lizzy and Jane)
“
dressed, went down to the bar, ordered champagne, and caught a whiff of a familiar scent. He turned, looked at her, and seemed to be seeing her for the first time. Because on the previous occasion, however often she had lain naked in his arms, she had been an appendage of Erika. Tonight she stood alone, and he realized that she was actually the more lovely of the two women, with her soft yellow hair floating past her shoulders, her crisply handsome features, her slender, long-legged body so entrancingly crowned by the surprisingly large bust, so perfectly delineated by the décolletage of her pale-blue evening gown. ‘It is me,’ she said. ‘Oh, please forgive me. I had forgotten how beautiful you are.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘You forgot what I looked like, in three weeks? But that was a very nice thing to say.’ ‘Drink?’ ‘If it’s from that bottle, yes, please.’ She sipped appreciatively. ‘I had not expected to see you again so soon.’ ‘But you remembered what I look like.’ ‘Oh, yes. I remember every part of you. Or do you not like direct women?’ ‘I like you,’ he said. ‘Shall we dine?’ They ordered. ‘And have you come all the way to Berlin just to see me?’ she asked. ‘I’m sorry, but the answer is no. I came to collect this.’ He touched his Cross. ‘Oh, good lord!’ she said. ‘And I never noticed. The fact is, almost every officer in town nowadays has one of those …’ She paused, her mouth making an O. ‘I have done it again. Would you like to beat me?’ ‘I find that a most attractive idea. But it can keep until after dinner.’ He tasted the wine, nodded. ‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I suspect the reason so many officers in Berlin sport Iron Crosses is that the men who do not have them are doing the actual fighting. Except that we are not doing any fighting right now, are we? There is no one left to fight.’ ‘There is still the English.’ ‘Ah, yes. The English. But they are hiding behind their water wall.’ ‘They come out from time to time.’ He suddenly felt an intense dislike for this gorgeous creature, who knew so little about anything beyond the narrow limits of her sexual morality. ‘But I did not invite you here to discuss the war. I would like you to spend the night.’ ‘Just like that?’ ‘Isn’t that what you do? Or do you only do it with your girlfriends, and any company they may happen to accumulate?’ She gazed at him for several seconds. ‘In normal circumstances, I would slap your face and throw this glass of wine into it. But I think that in the mood you are in, you might hit me back, and I do not wish there to be a scene. Why do you not tell me why you are in this mood? You should be on top of the world. You have just been decorated – was it by the Fuehrer himself?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Well, then, you have been honoured above most men. I assume he shook your hand?’ ‘Yes. Have you ever met him?’ ‘Sadly, no.’ ‘Well, maybe the whole thing made me too introspective. I apologize for what I said just now.’ She shrugged, delightfully, and finished her meal. ‘I understand your mood. Erika has often spoken of you.’ He frowned. ‘Regarding what?’ ‘Regarding everything.’ ‘Shit! I beg your pardon. But she really is a … well …’ ‘What you just said.’ ‘It’s her I ought to beat.’ Heidi drank the last of her wine. ‘But I am the one who is here.’ By the time he had locked the bedroom door she had already stepped out of her gown. She wore only
”
”
Alan Savage (Death in the Sky (RAF Saga #2))
“
Povera Kendra!” Elisa says, and then switches into English. “Poor Kendra! She must be very sad today. It is very much a shame. She feels stupid, yes? Molto sciocca. Of course, she knows that she is not the first girl. Luigi, he has another stupid foreign girl two years ago. She cries a lot too when she finds out that he has a wife--”
Paige stands up, shoving her chair back with a scrape along the floor.
“I’m not staying here to listen to this,” she says. “I’ve got better things to do. Like going to pee.”
“Yes,” I agree, standing up too. “I think I might go for a wee too. Good idea, Paige.”
Elisa isn’t as disconcerted by our deliberate vulgarity as we hoped. She’s homed in on the weak link in our chain, and now she leans in to focus on Kelly, whose face is still damp.
“And you, Kellee?” she asks sweetly. “What will you do--cry some more?”
“Shut up,” I snap, as Kelly does indeed heave a sob at this. But I’m eclipsed by Paige, who loathes Elisa at least as much as I do, and clearly needs a truly satisfactory outlet for her fury at what’s happened to Kendra.
“You,” she says to Elisa, rounding the table with the whirling-dervish fury of a tornado in wedge heels, “you stay away from us, you hear? All of us. I’ve totally had it with you sticking your nose in the air and thinking you’re better than us just because you’re practically anorexic! You’re only dating Luca--if you even are--because Violet turned him down! If you say a word to any of us that isn’t just hello or goodbye or pass the salt at dinner, so help me, I’ll haul off and smash your skinny ass through the nearest window, don’t think I won’t! Right in front of your mama, too!”
I think I’m sort of in love with Paige at that moment. Of course, if you asked me, I would totally say that violence is wrong and people shouldn’t menace other people, and that I’d be very sorry to see Elisa go flying through a french window.
”
”
Lauren Henderson (Kissing in Italian (Flirting in Italian, #2))
“
Our sanctification does not depend upon changing what we do, but in doing for God’s sake what we normally do for our own sake. It is sad to see how many people mistake the means for the end, addicting themselves to religious works, which they perform very imperfectly because of their human or selfish motives. The most excellent method he had found of going to God was to do our normal activities without any view of pleasing men, and (as far as we are able) purely for the love of God.
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Marshall Davis (The Practice of the Presence of God In Modern English)