Esi Edugyan Quotes

Folks think a lifetime is a thing stretched out over years. It ain't. It can happen quick as a match in a dark room.

It's like that, I guess, when the past come to collect what you owe.

I guess mercy is a muscle like any other. You got to exercise it, or it just cramp right up.

We must all take on faith the stories of our birth, for though we are in them, we are not yet present.

You were more concerned that slavery should be a moral stain upon white men than by the actual damage it wreaks on black men.

There are several kinds of happiness, Washington. Sometimes it is not for us to choose, or even understand, the one granted us.

You took me on because I was helpful in your political cause. Because I could aid in your experiments. Beyond that I was of no use to you, and so you abandoned me.” I struggled to get my breath. “I was nothing to you. You never saw me as equal. You were more concerned that slavery should be a moral stain upon white men than by the actual damage it wreaks on black men.

Negroes are God’s creatures also, with all due rights and freedoms. Slavery is a moral stain against us. If anything will keep white men from their heaven, it is this.

I understood there were many ways of being in the world, that to privilege one rigid set of beliefs over another was to lose something. Everything is bizarre, and everything has value. Or if not value, at least merits investigation.

To me, chocolate was the sole reason we on this earth.

The cabbie's eyes sort of glazed over. Canada kills any conversation quick, I learned long ago. It's a little trick of mine.

The kid come in at a strange angle, made the notes glitter like crystal.

Such a thing is not possible." I peered quietly at him. "Nothing is possible, sir, until it is made so.

Chip said it was his piano hands - one ain't never doing the same thing as the other.

Ain't no glory made from being dependable.

Hell," he said with a grin. "It's early yet. It's always early, while you still alive.

How could he have treated me so, he who congratulated himself on his belief that I was his equal? I had never been his equal. To him, perhaps, any deep acceptance of equality was impossible. He saw only those who were there to be saved, and those did the saving.

Ain't no man can outrun his fate.

What is luck but something made to run out.

I hesitate, I suppose it is only from a general dread of company. We all of us wish for it, in our solitude, but on the eve of a great visit, we shudder.

The wrecked visage I was forced to carry like an unwanted warning to others was to her a known thing, a familiar mask. She seemed to see beneath it something of her own suffering and recovery—the acceptance of a life-changing wound, the will to go on.

This sky, Sid.It's the sky of the great epics.The great Polish epics. Of Pan Tadeusz

Do you still call it talent, if it blooms without any kind of nurturing? That's got to be something else. She made talent sound like a damned insult.

Be faithful to what you see, Washington, and not to what you are supposed to see.

The first rule of science, Captain, is to doubt appearances and to seek substances in their stead.

What a strange journey we embarked upon that afternoon, full of anguish and desire and wonder.

How strange it felt to be alive, and whole, and astonishingly worth saving.

The dead have no compassion for the living.

Life holds a sanctity for them we can scarcely begin to imagine; it therefore struck them as absurd that someone would choose to end it.

How easy it is, to waste a life.

But human faces are so interesting,” said I. “Yes, to be sure. But when you are looking at one face, you are not looking at another. You are privileging that face. You are deciding who is worthy of observation and who is not. You are choosing who is worth preserving.

I thought of my existence before Titch's arrival, the brutal hours in the field under the crushing sun, the screams, the casual finality edging every slave's life, as though each day could very easily be the last. And that, it seemed to me clearly, was the more obvious anguish- that life had never belonged to any of us, even when we'd sought to reclaim it by ending it. We had been estranged from the potential of our own bodies, from the revelation of everything our minds and bodies could accomplish.

Children know everything about beauty,” Titch countered softly. “It is adults who have forgotten.

Everything is bizarre, and everything has value. Or if not value, at least merits investigation.

She laughed. I closed my eyes. It sounded damn mournful, that laugh of hers echoing off the square.

Her lips was hot, like the ridge of a cooking dish.

Tell me bout this caveman with the clam moustache been barkin speeches all over Germany.

The only time I ever saw him untidy was after a fight. What a sight that was. James Bond run through a blender. You know the other fella probably got off worse.

Chip recons that he is charming as hell, and who am I to poke holes in his theory. That means that sometimes lies leave his mouth dressed like truth. He just can’t help it.

Freedom, Wash, is a word with different meanings to different people,” he said, as though I did not know the truth of this better than he.

There's all sorts of ways to live, Chip. Some of them you give a lot. Some of them you take a lot. Art, jazz, it was a kind of taking. You take from the audience, you take from yourself.

Though a child, I did not picture a monster—he was no creature all teeth, all vicious blue eyes behind mangled wire spectacles; his voice was not slow and reptilian, his hands not huge black claws. I knew the nature of evil; I knew its benign, easy face. He would be a man, simply.

I had long seen science as the great equalizer. No matter one's race, or sex, or faith - there were facts in the world waiting to be discovered. How little thought I'd given to the ways in which it might be corrupted.

It ain’t fair. Gifts is divided so damn unevenly. Like God just left his damn sack of talents in a ditch somewhere and said, “Go help yourselves, ladies and gents.Them’s that get there first can help themselves to the biggest ones. In every other walk of life, a jack can work to get what he want. but ain’t no amount of toil going get you a lick more talent than you born with. Geniuses ain’t made, brother, they just is. and I just was not.

My current life, I realized, was constructed around an absence; for all its richness I still felt as if the floors might give way, as if its core were only a covering of leaves, and I would slip through, falling endlessly, never to get my footing.

But I thought I understood what she would not ask. I understood she desired to know if I had found what I was seeking, if this trip would finally satisfy my erratic pursuit of an unanswerable truth, if it would calm my sense of rootlessness, solve the chaos of my origins for me. She wanted to know if anything would be laid to rest, or if we’d continue to drift through the world together, going from place to place until I made her like me, so lacking a foothold anywhere that nowhere felt like home.

Baltimore always seems like the kind of city you either leaving or just returning to. Ain't no kinda place to hang your hat. Even as a kid I dreamed of getting out.

My father? I did not know my father.

Well, the main thing is to try not to die. I shall give you some advice on how to best bring that about.

Regent’s Park,” she said, frowning. “The Zoo is there, is it not? I daresay you should feel quite at home.” Again, she smiled. “In London, that is.

I was born with a ring of luck at my neck. Luck is its own kind of manacle, perhaps.

I understood there were many ways of being in the world, that to privilege one rigid set of beliefs over another was to lose something.

In any case, it was then I recognized that my own values—the tenets I hold dear as an Englishman—they are not the only, nor the best, values in existence.

You did not see me—you did not look at me, and see me. You wanted to, but you didn’t, you failed. You saw, in the end, what every other white man saw when he looked at me.

It ain't really Czechoslovakian,' I said, coughing. 'We used to call it the Cheque. Like, you drink it up now, you pay for it later.

It's always early, while you still alive.

and little grace or mercy behind me. I was nothing, I would die nothing, hunted

Our bodies know truths our minds neglect.” He

No secret can be kept for long. It is one of the truths of this world.

What our lives but a series of farewells and returns, no?

She loved me with a viciousness that kept me from ever feeling complacent, with the reminder that nothing was permanent, that we would one day be lost to each other.

We did not understand each other’s differing notions of property.

Was I shocked to find that the world of my childhood could be contained in a single crate?

I stood out, and felt the constant touch of others’ eyes.

dark Portuguese figs we’d given him from our trip to the Serra da Estrela.

I had never been his equal. To him, perhaps, any deep acceptance of equality was impossible. He saw only those were there to be saved, and those who did the saving.

There was but a thread between life and death, and he had stumbled blamelessly onto the wrong side of it.

Lion. He told me of the wreck, and of the oil, stranded in the white wastes, and of its worth. I thought

I liked him very much but did not trust either man.

agency

live always with your eyes cast forward, to seek what will be, for the path behind can never be retaken.

It was clear to me that both were intelligent, kind people, but careless with each other’s feelings, and poles apart in temperament. I liked both immensely; I hated their way together.

What is the truth of any life, Titch? I doubt even the man who lives it can say. You cannot know the true nature of another's suffering." "No. But you can try your damnedest not to worsen it.

They never returned. Only the old were left. And they began to die off. Those who did not die left the village by other means. In the end there was only one widow left, a dressmaker, and she began to sew the visages of those who had vanished. She hand-stitched the bodies and the clothes; she perfected the faces. Each and every doll was a precise replica of someone who once lived there.

What is the truth of any life, Titch? I doubt even the man who lives it can say. xxx You cannot know the true nature of another's suffering. No. But you can try your damnedest not to worsen it.

With a great sign Titch rose from his creaking seat. The impossible occurs so infrequently in this world, even to those who would devote their lives to studying it. But anyone could see: he ached to believe.

Well, now that is a question. I will only say that if I have acquired any wisdom from Big Kit, it is to live always with your eyes cast forward, to seek what will be, for the path behind can never be retaken.

It was I who had failed in my understanding, you see. Life holds a sanctity for them (referring to Solomon Islanders) we can scarcely begin to imagine; it therefore struck them as absurd that someone would choose to end it. A great ludicrous act. In any case, it was then I recognized that my own values - the tenets I hold dear as an Englishman - they were not the only, nor the best values in existence. I understood there were many ways of being in the world, that to privilege one rigid set of beliefs over another was to lose something. Everything is bizarre, and everything has value. Or if not value, at least merits investigation.

had long seen science as the great equalizer. No matter one’s race, or sex, or faith—there were facts in the world waiting to be discovered. How little thought I’d given to the ways in which it might be corrupted.

I hold dear as an Englishman—they are not the only, nor the best, values in existence. I understood there were many ways of being in the world, that to privilege one rigid set of beliefs over another was to lose something.

Mister Philip was merely a man of his class, nothing more. His great passions were not passions but distractions; one day was but a bridge to the next. He took in the world with a mild dissatisfaction, for the world was of little consequence.

This was not the only hazard, though it was the worst of them. White men were everywhere aggrieved, and they would sometimes rise up against us black devils, the miserable black scourge who would destroy their livelihood by labouring at cheaper rates.

And that, it seemed to me clearly, was the more obvious anguish—that life had never belonged to any of us, even when we’d sought to reclaim it by ending it. We had been estranged from the potential of our own bodies, from the revelation of everything our bodies and minds could accomplish.

Erasmus and I used to watch her as she sat for her Italian lessons in the afternoon. She was the most beautiful creature we knew. You were children, his father said. You knew nothing of beauty. Children know everything about beauty, Titch countered softly. It is adults who have forgotten.

I was nothing to you. You never saw me as equal. You were more concerned that slavery should be a moral stain upon white men than by the actual damage it wreaks on black men.” Even as I spoke these words, I could hear what a false picture they painted, and also how they were painfully true.

I would remove my shoes and, still clutching my belongings, lurch over the cold, damp rocks, the air smelling of wet weeds. With the sun just piercing the horizon, the light was hazy and filmy, the sand seeming to stretch on into oblivion. The sea foam stirred whitely at the edge of the water.

Jazz. Here in Germany it become something worse than a virus. We was all of us damn fleas, us Negroes and Jews and low-life hoodlums, set on playing that vulgar racket, seducing sweet blond kids into corruption and sex. It was a plague sent out by the dread black hordes, engineered by the Jews. Us Negroes, see, we was only half to blame - we just can't help it. Savages just got a natural feel for filthy rhythms, no self-control to speak of. But the Jews, brother, now they cooked up this jungle music on purpose. All part of their master plan to weaken Aryan youth, corrupt its janes, dilute its bloodlines.

case, it was then I recognized that my own values—the tenets I hold dear as an Englishman—they are not the only, nor the best, values in existence. I understood there were many ways of being in the world, that to privilege one rigid set of beliefs over another was to lose something. Everything is bizarre, and everything has value. Or if not value, at least merits investigation.

We will make land at Norfolk,' Titch said, as if this was some reassurance. It meant little to me, of course. Titch explained we would be entering Chesapeake Bay, and would therefore soon be leaving the ship. We would also, however, find ourselves subject to the laws of American freedom. 'Freedom, Wash, is a word with different meanings to different people,' he said, as though I did not know the truth of this better than he.

He did not ever mistreat me. But it was no kindness; for I knew this must all end, that I would be returned to the cane fields and their brutality someday. And so I did not allow myself to grow comfortable, but instead scrambled after thermometers tossed in the grass, gathered his dropped scopes, carefully folded leaves into the long wooden box he called his vasculum, feeling each evening only relief that I had not been punished.

Is it natural to sever low beings from their true and rightful destinies? From their natural-born purpose? To give them a false sense of agency? As if some creatures are not put here in the service of others. As if cows don’t exist to be eaten.” He turned his glass in his hands. “Nothing is accidental in the works of nature. Do you know who said that? Aristotle. He said, Nothing is accidental, everything is, absolutely, for the sake of something else.

kidnappers generally roamed the coast, and in the rainy, grey dusk they would stun a freed man in the street and drag him half-conscious onto a ship bound for the Southern states, to make of him a slave again. This was not the only hazard, though it was the worst of them. White men were everywhere aggrieved, and they would sometimes rise up against us black devils, the miserable black scourge who would destroy their livelihood by labouring at cheaper rates.

I thought of my existence before Titch’s arrival, the brutal hours in the field under the crushing sun, the screams, the casual finality edging every slave’s life, as though each day could very easily be the last. And that, it seemed to me clearly, was the more obvious anguish—that life had never belonged to any of us, even when we’d sought to reclaim it by ending it. We had been estranged from the potential of our own bodies, from the revelation of everything our bodies and minds could accomplish.

It had happened so gradually, but these months with Titch had schooled me to believe I could leave all misery behind, I could cast off all violence, outrun a vicious death. I had even begun thinking I'd been born for a higher purpose, to draw the earth's bounty, and to invent; I had imagined my existence a true and rightful part of the natural order. How wrong-headed it had all been. I was a black boy, only - I had no future before me, and little grace or mercy behind me. I was nothing I would die nothing, hunted hastily down and slaughtered.

She thought often of her own death, but without fear, loss having been her only belonging in this life. For years, acceptance had been her only means of survival. She knew that no matter how miserable or wretched life became, all she could do with her meek piece of time was sustain it. Decades of guilt, lost faith, the betrayal by those few people she'd let herself love - it was worth enduring these things, if only for the gift of a single, exalted moment. And such moments happened, even frequently, in the lives of people wise enough to see them.

An animal that can change itself to match its surroundings, just by contracting its skin? That can weigh as many stone as a man and stretch the length of a carriage, and yet fold its body through a crevice? Whose brain is wrapped about its throat—a brain no larger than a pea—but who is clever enough to play actual games? An animal with this much ingenuity, this much intelligence, who will sadly die within five years? I would not call that strange, but magisterial. Your nudibranch is nothing, dear George Washington Black. Octopodes are the gods of the sea.” “I think it is octopi.

I thought he throw us in the scullery fire for trying to get back to Dahomey. This, this nothing, boy. You never seen a bit of blood?' Of course I had. We had lived in blood for years, my entire life. But something about that evening - the gleaming beauty of the master's house, the refinements, the lazy elegance - made feel a profound, unsettling sense of despair. It was not only William's mutilation that day, knowing his head stared out over the fields even now, in the darkness. What I felt at that moment, though I then lacked the language for it, was the raw, violent injustice of it all.

The sexton studied me; again he clicked his tongue twice. “The boy, yes,” he said in his soft voice. “I do not much care for childhood. It is a state of terrible vulnerability, and is therefore unnatural and incompatible with human life. Everyone will cut you, strike you, cheat you, everyone will offer you suffering when goodness should reign. And because children can do nothing for themselves, they need good advocates, good parents. But a good parent is as rare as snow in summer, I am afraid. Well.” He smiled sadly. “It is possible I have some prejudices in this respect.” “You are an orphan yourself, are you

More troubling for myself, even beyond the unsettling idea of Titch's father surviving his own icy death, was the person of John Francis Willard. Who was he? Though a child, I did not picture a monster - he was no creature all teeth, all vicious blue eyes behind mangled wire spectacles; his voice was not slow and reptilian, his hands not huge black claws. I knew the nature of evil; I knew its benign, easy face. He would be a man, simply. And it was his very anonymity that would make it impossible to see him coming. When I tried to set it from my mind, to close my eyes, I saw his pale, expressionless face looming, and I did not want to live past this night.

new order Titch had sought to prevent was now reality. I stood in the cold as Mister Peter and the Esquimaux gathered up Mister Wilde from where he’d lain and carried him away. The hours passed; in the warm, dim glow of the igloo I sat staring at the thumbs of my torn mittens. I did not want to stay in that place. All my life I had known only the warmth of the Indies, the fresh salt of the sea air. I felt shuttered up, boxed in, shuddering with a cold no blanket or animal hide or fire could keep out. Mister Peter and the Esquimaux would, I knew, do their best to keep me safe, but with both Titch and his father gone, I did not know for how long. And so, as the hours passed, I began to collect up my belongings, and in the evening, when Mister Peter returned, I told him of my intention to leave. He