Esmeralda Quotes

To a gargoyle on the ramparts of Notre Dame as Esmeralda rides off with Gringoire Quasimodo says. "Why was I not made of stone like thee?

Que extraño que un corazón roto pudiera latir aún

A Magnificent Banquet, being A Thanksgiving for the Safe Return Of our Beloved Daughter, Princess Esmeralda. Bring your own plates.

How can you know what you're capable of if you don't embrace the unknown?

I learned you pay for your happiness. That's why I don't expect to be happy all the time. I'd rather be surprised by one moment every so often to remind me that joy is possible, even if I have to pay for it later.

For me, the person I was becoming when we left was erased, and another one was created.

What doesn't kill you, makes you fat.

Tell me who you walk with, and I'll tell you who you are.

You asked me why I saved you. You have forgotten a villain who tried to carry you off one night,- a villain to whom the very next day you brought relief upon their infamous pillory. A drop of water and a little pity are more than my whole life can ever repay. You have forgotten that villain; but he remembers." ~Quasimodo to Esmeralda~

If you know you're worth nothing, only a gamble with death can gratify your vanity.

Why was I not made of stone like thee? --Quasimodo[to a gargoyle on the ramparts of Notre Dame as Esmeralda rides off with Gringoire].

On the three pigs he and his wife own: "We acquired the pigs last year. My wife was born on a pig farm and has always been very fond of pigs. Of course, they are for eating, which is why they are named Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. You wouldn’t want to eat Rufus, Marcus and Esmeralda.

Ópalo y Ámbar forman el primer par, Ágata canta en si, del lobo el avatar, Dueto —¡Solutio!— con Aguamarina. Siguen poderosas las Esmeralda y la Citrina, los gemelos cornalina en Escorpión, y Jade, el número 8, digestión. En mi mayor: negra Turmalina, Zafiro en fa se ilumina. Y casi al mismo tiempo el Diamante, 11 y 7, del León rampante. ¡Projectio llega! Fluye el tiempo, Y Rubí constituye el final y el comienzo. De los Escritos secretos del conde de Saint Germain.

Only Esmeralda was not weeping. Instead she wore that wooden look that whites mistake for churlishenss or indifference. Woodrew knew it was neither. It was familiarity. This how real life is constituted, it said. This is grief and hatred and people hacked to death. This is the everyday we have known since we were born and you Wazungu have not.

That's the world out there, little green apples and infectious disease.

if she had not been a gypsy, and if he had not been a priest

Esmeralda, don’t blame your brother for his girlfriend’s lack of wits,” Sam admonished.

They have no achievements of their own. They've made nothing, created nothing, worked at nothing. They will leave no trace that they ever existed. They have no legacy except for their names, which they did nothing to earn.

Esmeralda?” Scarlett turned to the witch next. “Don’t you want to do magic, again?” “Of course I do! It’s the only thing I dream of. Casting spells… Turning people into frogs… Genetically engineering my gingerbread army…

God, I think I just hit a high E-flat - and I really held it!" Esmeralda said, after one of her more prolonged orgasms, but my ears were warm and sweaty, and my head had been held so tightly between her thighs that I hadn't heard anything.

A film can be undermined by the person you’re seeing it with, there in the dark, a ripple effect of attitude, scene by scene, shot by shot.

I dressed to their murmurs in the other room, their voices soft but strained, and I wondered if men ever talked like this, if their sorrows ever spilled into these secret cadences.

You're not going to die," Mama said sternly. "Darling," Esmeralda barked. "Everyone dies. The trick is to try to have some fun in the doing of it." Ch 6, page 41

Another train will come. Why rush? Why worry? Why go crazy? Another train will come. And sure enough, another train going my way was pulling into the station. My bad mood evaporated. I entered the car smiling, certain that there would be more missed trains in my life, more closed doors in my face, but there would always be another train rumbling down the tracks in my direction.

Oh ! l'amour ! dit-elle, et sa voix tremblait, et son oeil rayonnait. C'est être deux et n'être qu'un. Un homme et une femme qui se fondent en un ange. C'est le ciel.

In the twenty-one years I lived with my mother, we moved at least twenty times.

The night before I left my mother, I wrote a letter.

Was he at the movies to see a movie, she said, or maybe more narrowly, more essentially, simply to be at the movies?

Envy, Doña Lola had once said, eats at you from the inside and turns your eyes green when you look at the person of whom you’re jealous.

I love you, Esmeralda,” he said. “I love you, too,” she whispered back, and he couldn’t help smiling. At least he would die with those words in his ears.

If we isolate the stray thought, the passing thought," he said, "the thought whose origin is unfathomable, then we begin to understand that we are routinely deranged, everyday crazy.

There were more fights, more arguments, more yelling in the night, more long absences. Until it seemed as if anything would be better than living with these people who hated each other.

That's what got her, of course. That everyone thought it so unbelievable that she could possibly attract a man like him. It shouldn't upset her because it was true. She couldn't. Not in this world, in this lifetime. Yet she didn't appreciated everyone else acting as if they were the most improbable twosome since Quasimodo hit on Esmeralda.

It' her life, and she' in the middle of it.

—¿”Rubí”? —repetí yo. —Sí —dijo mamá—. Cada uno de los doce viajeros del tiempo está relacionado con una piedra preciosa. Y tú eres rubí. —¿De dónde has sacado eso? —«Ópalo y Ámbar forman el primer par, Ágata canta en si, del loba el avatar, dueto —¡Solutio!— con Aguamarina. Siguen poderosas la Esmeralda y la Citrina, los gemelos Cornalina en Escorpión, y Jade, el número ocho, digestión. En mi mayor: negra Turmalina, Zafiro en fa se ilumina. Y casi al mismo tiempo el Diamante, once y siete, del León rampante. ¡Projectio llega! Fluye el tiempo, y Rubí constituye el final y el comienzo». —Mamá me miró con una sonrisa más bien triste—. Aún me lo sé de memoria. Por alguna razón, durante su recitado, se me había puesto la carne de gallina. Sus palabras no me habían parecido tanto una poesía como un conjuro, algo que las brujas malvadas murmuraban en las películas mientras dan vueltas con una cuchara a una olla llena de vapores verdosos. —¿Qué se supone que significa?

DESPEDIDA DE UN PAISAJE No le reprocho a la primavera que llegue de nuevo. No me quejo de que cumpla como todos los años con sus obligaciones. Comprendo que mi tristeza no frenara la hierba. Si los tallos vacilan será sólo por el viento. No me causa dolor que los sotos de alisos recuperen su murmullo. Me doy por enterada de que, como si vivieras, la orilla de cierto lago es tan bella como era. No le guardo rencor a la vista por la vista de una bahía deslumbrante. Puedo incluso imaginarme que otros, no nosotros, están sentados ahora mismo sobre el abedul derribado. Respeto su derecho a reír, a susurrar y a quedarse felices en silencio. Supongo incluso que los une el amor y que él la abraza a ella con brazos llenos de vida. Algo nuevo, como un trino, comienza a gorgotear entre los juncos. De veras los deseo que lo oigan. No exijo ningún cambio de las olas a la orilla, ligeras o perezosas, pero no obedientes. Nada le pido a las aguas junto al bosque, a veces esmeralda, a veces zafiro, a veces negras. Una cosa no acepto. Volver a ese lugar. Renuncio al privilegio de la presencia.

A pesar de que estoy en el mismo lugar, casi a la misma hora e incluso en el asiento de siempre, cada día es diferente. Cada día vivo una aventura distinta, conozco a alguien nuevo, visito ciudades en las que nunca he estado y, a veces, incluso viajo a mundo inexistentes que a mí me parecen de los más reales. Es tan extraño como mágico poder visitar otros universos pasando páginas y páginas sin dejar de leer.

In a vast space left free between the crowd and the fire, a young girl was dancing. Whether this young girl was a human being, a fairy, or an angel, is what Gringoire, sceptical philosopher and ironical poet that he was, could not decide at the first moment, so fascinated was he by this dazzling vision. She was not tall, though she seemed so, so boldly did her slender form dart about. She was swarthy of complexion, but one divined that, by day, her skin must possess that beautiful golden tone of the Andalusians and the Roman women. Her little foot, too, was Andalusian, for it was both pinched and at ease in its graceful shoe. She danced, she turned, she whirled rapidly about on an old Persian rug, spread negligently under her feet; and each time that her radiant face passed before you, as she whirled, her great black eyes darted a flash of lightning at you. All around her, all glances were riveted, all mouths open; and, in fact, when she danced thus, to the humming of the Basque tambourine, which her two pure, rounded arms raised above her head, slender, frail and vivacious as a wasp, with her corsage of gold without a fold, her variegated gown puffing out, her bare shoulders, her delicate limbs, which her petticoat revealed at times, her black hair, her eyes of flame, she was a supernatural creature.

The shallower our arguments, the more intense we became.

People say great art is immortal. I say there's something mortal in it. It carries a glimpse of death.

I would just as soon remain jamona than shed that many tears over a man.

If you let me teach you not to end a sentence with a preposition, Edgar thought, I will save your life.

Realmente el amor es algo maravilloso: es más bello que las esmeraldas y más raro que los finos ópalos.

A imagem do seu rosto,com um sorriso estranhamente imperfeito e olhos de esmeralda atormentam-me o resto do dia.

Autora de los libros:Esmeralda Perdida/ Carta Pintada en la Noche/ Cuentos y Poesías para Niños: Amo a mis Animales/ Novela actual: 30 Años de Silencio

Era el gatazo de gentil persona y no menos galán que enamorado; bigote blanco y rostro despejado, ojos alegres, niñas mesuradas, de color de esmeraldas diamantadas,

guardapelos, broches, anillos, colgantes, cadenas. Los rubíes y las esmeraldas despedían destellos ígneos.

It didn’t matter if you were the Hunchback of Notre Dame, you still had a chance to romance Esmeralda.

A map of Esmeralda should include, marked in different colored inks, all these routes, solid and liquid, evident and hidden. It is more difficult to fix on the map the routes of the swallows, who cut the air over the roofs, dropping long invisible parabolas with their still wings, darting to gulp a mosquito, spiraling upward, grazing a pinnacle, dominating from every point of their airy paths all the points of the city.

Al leer aquellas dos páginas escritas por su hijo con esmeralda letra, aprendió la lección que tarde o temprano la mayoría de los padres aprenden algún día: que suelen ser los hijos quienes nos hieren de manera más atroz.

I thought about soccer in history, the inspiration for wars, truces, rampaging mobs. The game was a global passion, spherical ball, grass or turf, entire nations in spasms of elation or lament. But what kind of sport is it that disallows the use of players' hands, except for the goalkeeper? Hands are essential human tools, the things that grasp and hold, that make, take, carry, create. If soccer were an American invention, wouldn't some European intellectual maintain that our historically puritanical nature has compelled us to invent a game structured on anti-masturbatory principles?

Poor L. We are sorry that you left so soon. We are even sorrier to have inveigled our Esmeralda and mermaid into a naughty prank. That sort of game will never again be played with you, firebird. We apollo [apologize]. Remembrance, embers ans membranes of beauty make artists and morons loose all self-control. Pilots of tremendous air ships and coarse, smelly coachmen are known to have been driven insane by a pair of green eyes and a copper curl. We wished to admire and amuse you, BOP [Bird of Paradise]. We went too far. I, Van, went too far. We regret that shameful, though basically innocent scene. These are times of emotional stress and reconditioning. Destroy and forget. Tenderly yours, A & V (in alphabetic order).

It makes a man feel universal, floating over the continents, seeing the rim of the world, a line as clear as a compass arc, knowing it is just a turning of the bend to Atlantic twilight, to sediment plumes and kelp beds, an island chain glowing in the dusky sea.

Being perceived as excessively domestic can get you socially ostracized. When I made hand-rolled pasta for a dinner, I learned the hard way that some guests will find this annoying, as they do not feel comfortable eating a meal that they regard as the product of too much trouble. When my son was in nursery school, I made the mistake of spending a few hours sewing for him a Halloween astronaut costume of metallic cloth, earning the disgust, suspicion, and hard stares of many a fellow parent who had bought a Batman or Esmeralda costume. When

Los matices y tonalidades de verde eran tantos —serpiente, pulgón, esmeralda, mar, hierba, jade, espinaca, bilis, pino, oruga, pepino, hoja de té húmeda, hoja de té seca: ¡qué pobre es nuestro vocabulario para los colores!— que me dio miedo perder la capacidad de distinguir cualquier otro tono.

Furono trovati tra tutte quelle carcasse raccapriccianti due scheletri di cui uno teneva l'altro strettamente abbracciato. Uno di questi due scheletri, che era quello di una donna, aveva ancora qualche brandello di una veste la cui stoffa doveva essere stata bianca e intorno al collo una collana di adrézarach con un sacchettino di seta, ornato di vetri verdi, che era aperto e vuoto. Quegli oggetti avevano così poco valore che senza dubbio il boia non li aveva voluti. L'altro, che teneva questo primo scheletro strettamente abbracciato, era lo scheletro di un uomo. Fu notato che aveva la colonna vertebrale deviata, la testa nelle scapole, e una gamba più corta dell'altra. Non aveva però alcuna rottura di vertebre alla nuca, ed era evidente che non era stato impiccato. L'uomo al quale apparteneva era dunque andato là, e là vi era morto. Quando si cercò di staccarlo dallo scheletro che abbracciava, si disfece in polvere. " - Notre-Dame de Paris, V. Hugo

Esmeralda ficou mais encostada do que deitada, a vê-lo vestir-se na pouca claridade. Leu em cada gesto um verso de fazer sorrir, mesmo sem saber ler. Poesia de coração que amava. Cada peça de roupa vestida transformou-se em palavra bonita de se dizer sem letras. Coisa para gente simples entender sem estudar regras complicadas.

This was why love was so dangerous. Love turned the world into a garden, so beguiling it was easy to forget that rose petals sails appeared charmed. They blazed red in the day and silver at night, like a magician’s cloak, hinting at mysteries concealed beneath, which Tella planned to uncover that night. Drunken laughter floated above her as Tella delved deeper into the ship’s underbelly in search of Nigel the Fortune-teller. Her first evening on the vessel she’d made the mistake of sleeping, not realizing until the following day that Legend’s performers had switched their waking hours to prepare for the next Caraval. They slumbered in the day and woke after sunset. All Tella had learned her first day aboard La Esmeralda was that Nigel was on the ship, but she had yet to actually see him. The creaking halls beneath decks were like the bridges of Caraval, leading different places at different hours and making it difficult to know who stayed in which room. Tella wondered if Legend had designed it that way, or if it was just the unpredictable nature of magic. She imagined Legend in his top hat, laughing at the question and at the idea that magic had more control than he did. For many, Legend was the definition of magic. When she had first arrived on Isla de los Sueños, Tella suspected everyone could be Legend. Julian had so many secrets that she’d questioned if Legend’s identity was one of them, up until he’d briefly died. Caspar, with his sparkling eyes and rich laugh, had played the role of Legend in the last game, and at times he’d been so convincing Tella wondered if he was actually acting. At first sight, Dante, who was almost too beautiful to be real, looked like the Legend she’d always imagined. Tella could picture Dante’s wide shoulders filling out a black tailcoat while a velvet top hat shadowed his head. But the more Tella thought about Legend, the more she wondered if he even ever wore a top hat. If maybe the symbol was another thing to throw people off. Perhaps Legend was more magic than man and Tella had never met him in the flesh at all. The boat rocked and an actual laugh pierced the quiet. Tella froze. The laughter ceased but the air in the thin corridor shifted. What had smelled of salt and wood and damp turned thick and velvet-sweet. The scent of roses. Tella’s skin prickled; gooseflesh rose on her bare arms. At her feet a puddle of petals formed a seductive trail of red. Tella might not have known Legend’s true name, but she knew he favored red and roses and games. Was this his way of toying with her? Did he know what she was up to? The bumps on her arms crawled up to her neck and into her scalp as her newest pair of slippers crushed the tender petals. If Legend knew what she was after, Tella couldn’t imagine he would guide her in the correct direction, and yet the trail of petals was too tempting to avoid. They led to a door that glowed copper around the edges. She turned the knob. And her world transformed into a garden, a paradise made of blossoming flowers and bewitching romance. The walls were formed of moonlight. The ceiling was made of roses that dripped down toward the table in the center of the room, covered with plates of cakes and candlelight and sparkling honey wine. But none of it was for Tella. It was all for Scarlett. Tella had stumbled into her sister’s love story and it was so romantic it was painful to watch. Scarlett stood across the chamber. Her full ruby gown bloomed brighter than any flowers, and her glowing skin rivaled the moon as she gazed up at Julian. They touched nothing except each other. While Scarlett pressed her lips to Julian’s, his arms wrapped around her as if he’d found the one thing he never wanted to let go of. This was why love was so dangerous. Love turned the world into a garden, so beguiling it was easy to forget that rose petals were as ephemeral as feelings, eventually they would wilt and die, leaving nothing but the thorns.

It is just so interesting," he says at last. "The colors and all." The colors and all.

All human existence is a trick of light.

Do you know what friendship is?" he asked. "Yes," answered the girl; "it is to be brother and sister; two souls which meet without mingling, two fingers of one hand.

una idea espantosa ejecutada de forma brillante tiene que ser mejor que una idea brillante ejecutada de forma espantosa.

We came to Macun when I was four, to a rectangle of rippled metal sheets on stilts hovering in the middle of a circle of red dirt.

...and the shortcuts through the woods that led to the next barrio where all sorts of pocavergüenzas took place.

To men at this remove, it is as though things exist in their particular physical form in order to reveal the hidden simplicity of some powerful mathematical truth.

Do we have to believe something happened exactly the way it was shown by artists?

Never was keener anguish lavished upon a thing more charming or more delicate.

Minnesota is a human moment.

This spot was so close to perfect we would not even want to tell ourselves how lucky we were, having been delivered to it. The best of new places had to be protected from our own cries of delight. We would hold the words for weeks or months, for the soft evening when a stray remark would set us to recollecting. I guess we believed, together, that the wrong voice can obliterate a landscape.

There is a seaward bulge of stratocumulus. Sun glint and littoral drift. I see blooms of plankton in a blue of such Persian richness it seems an animal rapture, a colour change to express some form of intuitive delight.

I think of kids. It makes me feel selfish, to be so wary of having a family. Never mind do I have a job or not. I'll have a job soon, a good one. That's not it. I'm in awe of raising, basically, someone so tiny and soft.

Cada ser tinha sua própria gêmea, e passavam toda a vida, em sua busca. Muitas vezes, a pessoa nascia, sem que sua alma tivesse nascido também, e aquela pobre pessoa passava a ser solitária, sempre a espera de algo que não viria.

LA CUADRA Cuando, al mediodía, voy a ver a Platero, un transparente rayo del sol de las doce enciende un gran lunar de oro en la plata blanda de su lomo. Bajo su barriga, por el oscuro suelo, vagamente verde, que todo lo contagia de esmeralda, el techo viejo llueve claras monedas de fuego. Diana, que está echada entre las patas de Platero, viene a mí, bailarina, y me pone sus manos en el pecho, anhelando lamerme la boca con su lengua rosa. Subida en lo más alto del

any moment now that sun would burst into a ball of flame, a furnace to stifle the heart of Petites Cendres, his soul felt blood-raw, liquefied deep down inside him, in a pale, cold sea where the need that gnawed at him would break your heart, a fire burnt out, his heart, that dog should not have been there on Esmeralda or Bahama Street, hunger tottering on all fours, night-prowling around the Porte du Baiser Saloon where he just would not stop living despite all odds

Là, au milieu du pavé, — il était midi, — un grand soleil, — une créature dansait. Une créature si belle que Dieu l’eût préférée à la Vierge, et l’eût choisie pour sa mère, et eût voulu naître d’elle si elle eût existé quand il se fit homme !

-Pero -dijo Beauchamp, quien en su calidad de periodista era muy incrédulo-, ¿lleváis esas drogas con vos? -Constantemente -respondió Montecristo. -¿Sería indiscreción el pediros ver esas preciosas píldoras? -exclamó Beauchamp, creyendo poner al conde en un aprieto. -No, señor -respondió el conde, y sacó de su bolsillo una maravillosa cajita incrustada en una sola esmeralda, y cerrada por una rosca de oro, que desatornillándose, daba paso a una bolita de color verdoso y del tamaño de un guisante.

Don’t you sometimes feel a power in you? An extreme state of good health. An arrogant healthiness. That’s it. You are feeling so good you begin thinking you’re a little superior to most people. An optimism about yourself that you generate at the expense of others. Don’t you sometimes feel this?

I was just a few inches away from him and I can feel his breath touches my face. My head started to feel dizzy and my heart was skipping a few beats, like I was having a heart attack. My stomach does a somersault and my brain suddenly shuts down from processing. Beneath me is the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. -Amanda

It's almost unbelievable when you think of it, how they live there in all that ice and sand and mountainous wilderness. Look at it,' he says. 'Huge barren deserts, huge oceans. How do they endure all those terrible things? The floods alone. The earthquakes alone make it crazy to live there. Look at those fault systems. They're so big, there's so many of them. The volcanic eruptions alone. What could be more frightening than a volcanic eruption? How do they endure avalanches, year after year, with numbing regularity? It's hard to believe people live there. The floods alone. You can see whole huge discolored areas, all flooded out, washed out. How do they survive, where do they go? Look at the cloud buildups. Look at that swirling storm center. What about the people who live in the path of a storm like that? It must be packing incredible winds. The lightning alone. People exposed on beaches, near trees and telephone poles. Look at the cities with their spangled lights spread in all directions. Try to imagine the crime and violence. Look at the smoke pall hanging low. What does that mean in terms of respiratory disorders? It's crazy. Who would live there? The deserts, how they encroach. Every year they claim more and more arable land. How enormous those snowfields are. Look at the massive storm fronts over the ocean. There are ships down there, small craft, some of them. Try to imagine the waves, the rocking. The hurricanes alone. The tidal waves. Look at those coastal communities exposed to tidal waves. What could be more frightening than a tidal wave? But they live there, they stay there. Where could they go?

—Se me han dormido las manos. Sam suspiró y tras dejar su pincel y su paleta, se acercó hacia mí. Me acarició lentamente mis manos entre las suyas con cariño. Su contacto era tan cálido a diferencia de mí, que sin poder evitarlo tuve un escalofrío. Estaba helada de frío y hechizada por la intensidad de sus ojos esmeraldas. —Sam tengo frío —dije. Y él ante mi comentario sonrió, acercándose más hacía mí. Me estrechó entre sus brazos y con sus manos acarició mi espalda intentando hacerme entrar en calor. —¿Estás mejor? —preguntó instantes después. Escuchar su respiración, el sonido de su corazón y su aliento tan cerca de mí, me provocaban un éxtasis que nunca había sentido. —No —mentí.

We listen to the old radio shows. Light flares and spreads across the blue-banded edge, sunrise, sunset, the urban grids in shadow. There is a sweetness in the tenor voice of the young man singing, a simple vigour that time and distance and random noise have enveloped in eloquence and yearning. Every sound, every lilt of strings has this veneer of age.

El bohío de la loma, bajo sus alas de paja, siente el frescor mañanero y abre sus ojos al alba. Vuela el pájara del nido. Brinca el gallo de la rama. A los becerros, aislados de las tetas de las vacas, les corre por el hocico leche de la madrugada. Las mariposas pululan —rubí, zafir, oro, plata...—: flores huérfanas que rondan buscando a las madres ramas...

Quasimodo allora alzò nuovamente lo sguardo sull’egiziana di cui vedeva il corpo, appeso alla forca, fremere da lontano sotto l’abito bianco negli ultimi spasimi dell’agonia, poi li abbassò sull’arcidiacono disteso ai piedi della torre senza più forma umana, e disse con un singhiozzo dal profondo del petto: «Oh! Tutto ciò ce ho amato!»" -Notre-Dame de Paris, V. Hugo

In the Spanish-speaking Americas, Christmas is much more than a one-day event followed by a staggering credit card bill. The festivities last for weeks, beginning well before Christmas, and continuing straight through to the arrival of the Three Kings and the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6. Las Navidades involves a lot more partying and a lot less shopping than a US. Christmas.

Ana had experienced reactions like Ramon's in the mirrored salons of Sevilla society, in the waxed halls of the Convento de las Buenas Madres, on the streets of Cadiz and San Juan. It was a look that said, "I see you, but I deign not to speak to you." It said, "I see you but I do not share the high opinion you have of yourself." It said, "I see you but you're not who I want to see." It said, "To me, you don't exist.

En ese juzgado todos usaban corbata pero se veían sucios, sudados, la ropa pegada como cataplasma, los trajes lustrados, llenos de lamparones, del horrible color café que acostumbran los morenos y los hace parecer una tablilla de chocolate rancio. Lucita suplía su baja estatura con colores chillones; por ejemplo, una falda verde con una blusa nailon amarilla o al revés; puras combinaciones cirqueras, pero ahora su expresión era tan entusiasta que se veía atractiva; el interés los ennoblecía a todos; habían dejado de chanclear, rascarse, embarrarse en contra de los muros; ninguna desidia podía flotar ahora en el recinto; cobraban vida, recordaban que alguna vez fueron hombres, y no sólo eso sino jóvenes, ajenos al papeleo y a la tarjeta marcada; una gota de agua cristalina resplandecía sobre cada una de sus cabezas: Esmeralda los estaba bañando.

Pienso en Él. En todo lo que tocan sus manos plasmadas de esmeraldas, y digo: Feliz tú, libro, que sientes la calidez de su piel. Tú que no lo deseas. Libro, señor libro, hermano libro, feliz tú, feliz usted, que recibe la inmarcesible tersura de sus dedos. Feliz tú, papel blanco lleno de dibujitos indelebles. Tú que no lo amas. Tú, que con solo mostrar tu desnudo perfil recibes el abrazo de su mirada. ¡Feliz tú, hojas de papel en blanco! ¿Y usted, señor suelo? ¿Qué decir de usted, usted que tiene el honor de recibir su paso, usted que lo sostiene, usted que es marcado con su maravilloso ritmo? ¡¡Feliz de usted, señor suelo, feliz de usted, usted que no lo desea!! ¡Oh escaleras brillosas, vasos inertes, cubiertos indiferentes, trajes irreflexivos, sillones insulsos, útiles impersonales, felices de ustedes, que lo ven, que lo sienten! ¡y no lo anhelan!

People had hoped to be caught up in something bigger than themselves. They thought it would be a shared crisis. They would feel a sense of shared purpose, shared destiny. Like a snowstorm that blankets a large city – but lasting months, lasting years, carrying everyone along, creating fellow feeling where there was only suspicion and fear. The war would ennoble everything we say and do. What was impersonal would become personal. What was solitary would be shared.

Ahí hay un sitio —le indico para que aparque. Me bajo del coche con cuidado de que no se me arrugue el vestido que tomé ayer prestado del armario de Sam. Tiene una colección enorme de su época en el bufete en la que tenía que ir siempre muy arreglada. Odio esa palabra. No se debería utilizar esa expresión para imponer a las mujeres un estándar de belleza concreto que marca cómo deben ir vestidas, peinadas y maquilladas. No estamos rotas por lo que no debemos arreglarnos.

If we isolate the stray thought, the passing thought,” he said, “the thought whose origin is unfathomable, then we begin to understand that we are routinely deranged, everyday crazy.” We loved the idea of being everyday crazy. It rang so true, so real. “In our privatest mind,” he said, “there is only chaos and blur. We invented logic to beat back our creatural selves. We assert or deny. We follow M with N.” Our privatest mind, we thought. Did he really say that? “The only laws that matter are laws of thought.” His fists were clenched on the tabletop, knuckles white. “The rest is devil worship," he said.

Oh ! aimer une femme ! être prêtre ! être haï ! l’aimer de toutes les fureurs de son âme, sentir qu’on donnerait pour le moindre de ses sourires son sang, ses entrailles, sa renommée, son salut, l’immortalité et l’éternité, cette vie et l’autre ; regretter de ne pas être roi, génie, empereur, archange, dieu, pour lui mettre un plus grand esclave sous les pieds ; l’étreindre nuit et jour de ses rêves et de ses pensées ; et la voir amoureuse d’une livrée de soldat ! et n’avoir à lui offrir qu’une sale soutane de prêtre dont elle aura peur et dégoût ! Être présent, avec sa jalousie et sa rage, tandis qu’elle prodigue à un misérable fanfaron imbécile des trésors d’amour et de beauté ! Voir ce corps dont la forme vous brûle, ce sein qui a tant de douceur, cette chair palpiter et rougir sous les baisers d’un autre ! Ô ciel ! aimer son pied, son bras, son épaule, songer à ses veines bleues, à sa peau brune, jusqu’à s’en tordre des nuits entières sur le pavé de sa cellule, et voir toutes les caresses qu’on a rêvées pour elle aboutir à la torture ! N’avoir réussi qu’à la coucher sur le lit de cuir ! Oh ! ce sont là les véritables tenailles rougies au feu de l’enfer ! Oh ! bienheureux celui qu’on scie entre deux planches, et qu’on écartèle à quatre chevaux ! — Sais-tu ce que c’est que ce supplice que vous font subir, durant les longues nuits, vos artères qui bouillonnent, votre cœur qui crève, votre tête qui rompt, vos dents qui mordent vos mains ; tourmenteurs acharnés qui vous retournent sans relâche, comme sur un gril ardent, sur une pensée d’amour, de jalousie et de désespoir ! Jeune fille, grâce ! trêve un moment ! un peu de cendre sur cette braise ! Essuie, je t’en conjure, la sueur qui ruisselle à grosses gouttes de mon front ! Enfant ! torture-moi d’une main, mais caresse-moi de l’autre ! Aie pitié, jeune fille ! aie pitié de moi !

You have been a child, reader, and you would, perhaps, be very happy to be one still. It is quite certain that you have not, more than once (and for my part, I have passed whole days, the best employed of my life, at it) followed from thicket to thicket, by the side of running water, on a sunny day, a beautiful green or blue dragon-fly, breaking its flight in abrupt angles, and kissing the tips of all the branches. You recollect with what amorous curiosity your thought and your gaze were riveted upon this little whirlwind, hissing and humming with wings of purple and azure, in the midst of which floated an imperceptible body, veiled by the very rapidity of its movement. The aerial being which was dimly outlined amid this quivering of wings, appeared to you chimerical, imaginary, impossible to touch, impossible to see. But when, at length, the dragon-fly alighted on the tip of a reed, and, holding your breath the while, you were able to examine the long, gauze wings, the long enamel robe, the two globes of crystal, what astonishment you felt, and what fear lest you should again behold the form disappear into a shade, and the creature into a chimera! Recall these impressions, and you will readily appreciate what Gringoire felt on contemplating, beneath her visible and palpable form, that Esmeralda of whom, up to that time, he had only caught a glimpse, amidst a whirlwind of dance, song, and tumult.

Vous avez été enfant, lecteur, et vous êtes peut-être assez heureux pour l'être encore. Il n'est pas que vous n'ayez plus d'une fois (et pour mon compte j'y ai passé des journées entières, les mieux employées de ma vie) suivi de broussaille en broussaille, au bord d'une eau vive, par un jour de soleil, quelque belle demoiselle verte ou bleue, brisant son vol à angles brusques et baisant le bout de toutes les branches. Vous vous rappelez avec quelle curiosité amoureuse votre pensée et votre regard s'attachaient à ce petit tourbillon sifflant et bourdonnant, d'ailes de pourpre et d'azur, au milieu duquel flottait une forme insaisissable voilée par la rapidité même de son mouvement. L'être aérien qui se dessinait confusément à travers ce frémissement d'ailes vous paraissait chimérique, imaginaire, impossible à toucher, impossible à voir. Mais lorsque enfin la demoiselle se reposait à la pointe d'un roseau et que vous pouviez examiner, en retenant votre souffle, les longues ailes de gaze, la longue robe d'émail, les deux globes de cristal, quel étonnement n'éprouviez-vous pas et quelle peur de voir de nouveau la forme s'en aller en ombre et l'être en chimère ! Rappelez-vous ces impressions, et vous vous rendrez aisément compte de ce que ressentait Gringoire en contemplant sous sa forme visible et palpable cette Esmeralda qu'il n'avait entrevue jusque-là qu'à travers un tourbillon de danse, de chant et de tumulte.

Quando tutto è nuovo, il piacere è tutto in superficie.

Toda acción causa frutos. Una buena acción el fruto es dulce y una mala es amargo.

éste debe ser capaz de explicar no solamente un espectro de conductas infantiles normales y anormales, sino su desarrollo progresivo interactuando con la maduración cerebral en sus tres ejes: vertical (subcortical-cortical) horizontal (intra-hemisférica) e inter-hemisférica.

She’d worried at the beginning when she first met them that there were too many patrones. But within weeks she was sure that there was really one boss, and that the other three were working for her.

Me doy cuenta ahora de que el primer día apenas llegué a mirar. Creía estar mirando, pero solo estaba percibiendo un mero barrunto de lo que hay en estos cuadros. Ahora es cuando estoy empezando a mirar.

Plito, chicken Gallina, hen Lápiz, pencil y Pluma, pen. Ventana, window Puerta, door Maestra, teacher y Piso, floor.

For he was their Victor Hugo. And his Paris, the Paris of Esmeralda and Jean Valjean, would live forever.