Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society Quotes

I don't want to be married just to be married. I can't think of anything lonelier than spending the rest of my life with someone I can't talk to, or worse, someone I can't be silent with.

Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books.

That's what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you to another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive - all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.

Perhaps there is some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers. How delightful if that were true.

Men are more interesting in books than they are in real life.

Think of it! We could have gone on longing for one another and pretending not to notice forever. This obsession with dignity can ruin your life if you let it.

Life goes on." What nonsense, I thought, of course it doesn't. It's death that goes on.

I have gone to [this bookshop] for years, always finding the one book I wanted - and then three more I hadn’t known I wanted.

We clung to books and to our friends; they reminded us that we had another part to us.

All my life I thought that the story was over when the hero and heroine were safely engaged -- after all, what's good enough for Jane Austen ought to be good enough for anyone. But it's a lie. The story is about to begin, and every day will be a new piece of the plot.

Have you ever noticed that when your mind is awakened or drawn to someone new, that person's name suddenly pops up everywhere you go? My friend Sophie calls it coincidence, and Mr. Simpless, my parson friend, calls it Grace. He thinks that if one cares deeply about someone or something new one throws a kind of energy out into the world, and "fruitfulness" is drawn in.

Isola doesn't approve of small talk and believes in breaking the ice by stomping on it.

I sometimes think I prefer suitors in books rather than right in front of me. How awful, backward, cowardly, and mentally warped that will be if it turns out to be true.

I love seeing the bookshops and meeting the booksellers-- booksellers really are a special breed. No one in their right mind would take up clerking in a bookstore for the salary, and no one in his right mind would want to own one-- the margin of profit is too small. So, it has to be a love of readers and reading that makes them do it-- along with first dibs on the new books.

I am to cover the philosophical side of the debate and so far my only thought is that reading keeps you from going gaga.

Then I imagined a lifetime of having to cry to get him to be kind, and I went back to no again.

My worries travel around in my head on their well worn path

Because there is nothing I would rather do than rummage through bookshops, I went at once to Hastings & Sons Bookshop upon receiving your letter. I have gone to them for years, always finding the one book I wanted - and then three more I hadn't known I wanted.

Naturally curly hair is a curse, and don't ever let anyone tell you different.

Men are more interesting in books than they are in real life.

If I could have anything I wanted, I would choose story without end, and it seems I have lots of company in that.

Your questions regarding that gentleman are very delicate, very subtle, very much like being smacked in the head with a mallet...it's a tuba among the flutes.

That's what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It's geometrically progressive—all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.

Do you arrange your books alphabetically? (I hope not.)

Will Thisbee gave me The Beginner's Cook-Book for Girl Guides. It was just the thing; the writer assumes you know nothing about cookery and writes useful hints - "When adding eggs, break the shells first.

Treat a dog right and he'll treat you right. ... Cats is different, but I never held it against them.

I am a grown woman-- mostly-- and I can guzzle champagne with whomever I choose.

Moses: God or crowd control?!?

Humour is the best way to make the unbearable bearable.

It was amazing to me then, and still is, that so many people who wander into bookshops don't really know what they're after--they only want to look around and hope to see a book that will strike their fancy. And then, being bright enough not to trust the publisher's blurb, they will ask the book clerk the three questions: (1) What is it about? (2) Have you read it? (3) Was it any good?

I can’t think of anything lonelier than spending the rest of my life with someone I can’t talk to, or worse, someone I can’t be silent with.

Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books.

Reading keeps you from going ga-ga.

The first rule of snooping is to come at it sideways.

His writings have made me his friend.

After all, what's good enough for Austen ought to be good enough for anyone.

It suddenly struck me that Dawsey is a lonesome person. I think it may be that he has always been lonely, but he didn't mind before, and now he minds.

I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers.

You know how I love talking about books, and you know how I adore receiving compliments.

‎What a blight that woman is. Do you happen to know why? I lean toward a malignant fairy at her christening.

I never met a man half so true as a dog. Treat a dog right, and he'll treat you right. He'll keep you company, be your friend, and never ask you no questions. Cats is different, but I never held that against 'em.

We could have gone on longing for one another and pretending not to notice forever. This obsession with dignity can ruin your life if you let it.

It is better to know the truth than live in uncertainty.

It was not a windy day, my hair always looks like that.

Is it so small a thing to have enjoyed the sun, to have lived light in the spring, to have loved, to have thought, to have done, to have advanced true friends?" It isn't. I hope, wherever she is, she has that in her mind.

Friends, show me a man who hates himself, and I'll show you a man who hates his neighbors more! He'd have to—you'd not grant anyone else something you can't have for yourself—no love, no kindness, no respect!

По някакъв вълшебен начин ние образуваме литературен клуб всеки път, когато услужим на някого с книга ...

Do you suppose the St. Swithin's furnace-man was my one true love? Since I never spoke to him, it seems unlikely, but at least it was a passion unscathed by disappointment.

I know that I am fortunate to have any place at all to live in London, but I much prefer whining to counting my blessings.

It would have been better for her not to have such a heart". Yes, but worse for the rest of us.

one year as his wife, and id have become one of those abject, quaking women who look at their husbands when someone asks them a question. I've always despised that type, but I see how it happens now

Thinking to comfort me, they said, "Life goes on." What nonsense, I thought, of course it doesn't. It's death that goes on; Ian is dead now and will be dead tomorrow and the next year and forever. There is no end to that, but perhaps there will be an end to the sorrow of it.

What on earth did you say to Isola? She stopped in on her way to pick up Pride and Prejudice and to berate me for never telling her about Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy. Why hadn't she known there were better love stories around? Stories not riddled with ill-adjusted men, anguish, death and graveyards!

I believe I am becoming pathetic. I'll go further, I believe that I am in love with a flower-growing, wood-carving quarryman/carpenter/pig farmer. In fact, I know I am. Perhaps tomorrow I will become entirely miserable at the thought that he doesn't love me back - may, even, care for Remy- but at this precise moment I am succumbing to euphoria. My head and stomach feel quite odd.

He had no imagination either-fatal for one engaged in child-rearing

I did not want to spend my time reading about people who never were, doing things they never did.

If there is Predestination, then God is the devil.

I, too, have felt that the war goes on and on. When my son, Ian, died at El Alamein-- side by side with... visitors offering their condolences, thinking to comfort me, said, "Life goes on." What nonsense, I thought, of course it doesn't. It's death that goes on; Ian is dead now and will be dead tomorrow and nexe year and forever. There's no end to that. But perhaps there will be an end to the sorrow of it.

I kept trying to explain and he kept shouting until I began to cry from frustration. Then he felt remorseful, which was so unlike him and endearing that I almost changed my mind and said yes. But then I imagined a lifetime of having to cry to get him to be kind, and I went back to no again.

My worries travel about my head on their well-worn path, and it is a relief to put them on paper.

We clung to books and to our friends; they reminded us that we had another part to us.

Mary Ann could no more endure a day without reading than she could grow feathers.

That’s what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It’s geometrically progressive—all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment.

He didn't say much at our first meeting - nor at any of our meetings since, come to think of it - but left him into a room, and everyone in it seems to breathe a sigh of relief. I have never in my life had that effect on anyone; I can't imagine why not.

Women like poetry. A soft word in their ears and they melt - a grease spot on the grass.

People don't know how chickens can turn on you, but they can -- just like mad dogs.

I have seized the day, and the night too.

I suppose I do have a suitor, but I'm not really used to him yet. He's terribly charming and he plies me with delicious meals, but I sometimes think I prefer suitors in books rather than right in front of me.

The first rule of snooping is to come at it sideways--when you began writing me dizzy letters about Alexander, I didn't ask if you were in love with him, I asked what his favorite animal was. And your answer told me everything I needed to know about him--how many men would admit that they loved ducks?

Night-time train travel is wonderful again! No standing in the corridors for hours, no being shunted off for a troop train to pass, and above all, no black-out curtains. All the windows we passed were lighted, and I could snoop once more. I missed it so terribly during the war. I felt as if we had all turned into moles scuttling along in our separate tunnels. I don't consider myself a real peeper-they go in for bedrooms, but it's families in sitting rooms or kitchens that thrill me. I can imagine their entire lives from a glimpse of bookshelves, or desks, or lit candles, or bright sofa cushions.

How could I ever have considered marrying him? One year as his wife, and I'd have become one of those abject, quaking women who look at their husbands when someone asks them a question. I've always despised that type, but I see how it happens now.

He's always had more than his fair share of what we call cheek and what Americans call can-do spirit.

A sunny nature? A light heart? I have never been so insulted. Light-hearted is a short step from witless in my book. A cackling buffoon

But we did. The old adage—humor is the best way to make the unbearable bearable—may be true.

That’s what I told myself – Well, you’re still alive. I think all of us said the same each morning when we woke up – Well, I’m still alive. But the truth is, we weren’t. What we were – it wasn’t dead, but it wasn’t alive either.

We could have gone on longing for one another and pretending not to notice forever. This obsession with dignity can ruin your life if you let it.

Phrenology: the Science of Interpreting Bumps on the Head.

Nos aferramos a los libros y a nuestros amigos; nos recordaban que podíamos desempeñar otro papel.

Все едно му бях предложил да му подаря луната.

Leggere bei libri ti toglie per sempre il piacere di leggere quelli brutti.

No hay hada que te haga sentir más sola que pasar el resto de tu vida con alguien con quien no se pueda hablar, o peor, con alguien con quien no se pueda estar en silencio.

My neighbor Evangeline Smythe is going to have twins in June. She is none too happy about it, so I am going to ask her to give one of them to me.

Vielleicht haben Bücher einen geheimen Instinkt, der sie den idealen Lesern zuführt. Wie wunderbar, wenn es so wäre.

Quizás hay en los libros algún tipo de instinto secreto que les lleva a sus lectores perfectos. ¡Sería maravilloso que fuera verdad!

I think you learn more if you’re laughing at the same time.

Su fortaleza nunca la abandonó, ni nunca perdió la cabeza, solo vio demasiada crueldad.

На нашому острові загинуло тисячі полонених чоловіків та хлопчиків. Нещодавно я дізналася, що це нелюдське ставлення було передбачено планом Гіммлера, який має назву «Смерть від виснаження».

Ето затова обичам да чета: някоя дреболия те заинтригува и това те отвежда до нова книга, където те грабва нещо друго, стигаш до трета и така нататък. Това е една геометрична прогресия, която няма край и служи единствено на удоволствието.

[I] threw open the door to find Rob sit­ting on the low stool in front of my book­case, sur­round­ed by card­board box­es. He was seal­ing the last one up with tape and string. There were eight box­es - eight box­es of my books bound up and ready for the base­ment! "He looked up and said, 'Hel­lo, dar­ling. Don't mind the mess, the care­tak­er said he'd help me car­ry these down to the base­ment.' He nod­ded to­wards my book­shelves and said, 'Don't they look won­der­ful?' "Well, there were no words! I was too ap­palled to speak. Sid­ney, ev­ery sin­gle shelf - where my books had stood - was filled with ath­let­ic tro­phies: sil­ver cups, gold cups, blue rosettes, red rib­bons. There were awards for ev­ery game that could pos­si­bly be played with a wood­en ob­ject: crick­et bats, squash rac­quets, ten­nis rac­quets, oars, golf clubs, ping-​pong bats, bows and ar­rows, snook­er cues, lacrosse sticks, hock­ey sticks and po­lo mal­lets. There were stat­ues for ev­ery­thing a man could jump over, ei­ther by him­self or on a horse. Next came the framed cer­tificates - for shoot­ing the most birds on such and such a date, for First Place in run­ning races, for Last Man Stand­ing in some filthy tug of war against Scot­land. "All I could do was scream, 'How dare you! What have you DONE?! Put my books back!' "Well, that's how it start­ed. Even­tu­al­ly, I said some­thing to the ef­fect that I could nev­er mar­ry a man whose idea of bliss was to strike out at lit­tle balls and lit­tle birds. Rob coun­tered with re­marks about damned blue­stock­ings and shrews. And it all de­gen­er­at­ed from there - the on­ly thought we prob­ably had in com­mon was, What the hell have we talked about for the last four months? What, in­deed? He huffed and puffed and snort­ed and left. And I un­packed my books.

All my life I thought that the story was over when the hero and heroine were safely engaged—after all, what’s good enough for Jane Austen ought to be good enough for anyone. But it’s a lie. The story is about to begin, and every day will be a new piece of the plot.

No one in their right mind would take up clerking in a bookstore for the salary, and no one in his right mind would want to own one—the margin of profit is too small. So, it has to be a love of readers and reading that makes them do it—along with first dibs on the new books.

Eso es lo que me encanta de la literatura; en un libro encuentras un detalle diminuto que te interesa y ese detalle te lleva a otro libro y algo en ese te lleva a un tercer libro. Es matemáticamente progresivo, sin final a la vista y sin ninguna otra razón que no sea por puro placer.

Thousands of those men and boys died here, and I have recently learned that their inhuman treatment was the intended policy of Himmler. He called his plan Death by Exhaustion, and he implemented it. Work them hard, don't waste valuable foodstuffs on them, and let them die. They could, and would, always be replaced by new slave workers from Europe's Occupied countries.

At the war’s end, I, too, promised myself that I had done with talking about it. I had talked and lived war for six years, and I was longing to pay attention to something—anything—else. But that is like wishing I were someone else. The war is now the story of our lives, and there’s no subtracting it.

Toda mi vida he pensado que la historia se terminaba cuando el héroe la heroína se casaban... después de todo, lo que es suficientemente bueno para Jane Austen debería ser lo suficientemente bueno para cualquiera. Pero eso es mentira. La historia está a punto de empezar, y cada día será una nueva pieza del argumento.

Приятно ми е да обикалям по книжарниците и да разговарям с продавачите. Те наистина са особен тип хора. Никой нормален човек не би се хванал да работи в книжарница, още по-малко пък би отворил своя, тъй като печалбата е твърде малка. Явно причината е в любовта към читателите и четенето, както и в привилегията първи да се докоснеш до новите заглавия.

They came here on Sunday, 30th June, 1940, after bombing us two days before. They said they hadn't meant to bomb us; they mistook our tomato lorries on the pier for army trucks. How they came to think that strains the mind. They bombed us, killing some thirty men, women, and children - one among them was my cousin's boy. He had sheltered underneath his lorry when he first saw the planes dropping bombs, and it exploded and caught fire. They killed men in their lifeboats at sea. They strafed the Red Cross ambulances carrying our wounded. When no one shot back at them, they saw the British had left us undefended. They just flew in peaceably two days later and occupied us for five years.

Ninguno de nosotros tenía experiencia con clubs de lectura, así que pusimos nuestras propias normas. Nos turnamos para hablar de los libros que habíamos leído. Al principio, intentamos estar tranquilos siendo objetivos, pero esto pronto se acabó, y el propósito de los que hablaban fue incitar a los demás a que leyeran el libro. Cuando dos miembros había leído el mismo libro, podían debatir, cosa que nos encantaba. Leíamos libros, hablábamos de libros, discutíamos sobre libros, y nos fuimos cogiendo cariño unos a otros.

Los libreros de verdad, incorregibles, como Sophie y yo, no saben mentir. La cara siempre nos delata. Una ceja levantada o una mueca revelan que el libro no merece la pena, y entonces los clientes inteligentes piden que les recomendemos otra cosa, con lo cual los llevamos a la fuerza hasta un volumen en concreto y les ordenamos que lo lean. Si lo leen y les desagrada, nunca volverán. Pero si les gusta, serán clientes para toda la vida.

P.S. Mrs. Maugery lent me a book last week. It’s called The Oxford Book of Modern Verse, 1892–1935. They let a man named Yeats make the choosings. They shouldn’t have. Who is he—and what does he know about verse? I hunted all through that book for poems by Wilfred Owen or Siegfried Sassoon. There weren’t any—nary a one. And do you know why not? Because this Mr. Yeats said—he said, “I deliberately chose NOT to include any poems from World War I. I have a distaste for them. Passive suffering is not a theme for poetry.” Passive Suffering? Passive Suffering! I nearly seized up. What ailed the man? Lieutenant Owen, he wrote a line, “What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? Only the monstrous anger of the guns.” What’s passive about that, I’d like to know? That’s exactly how they do die. I saw it with my own eyes, and I say to hell with Mr. Yeats.