She looks at me, this is not what she had expected, she sniffs at the food and only slowly starts to eat, swallows each mouthful with demonstrative gloom, and then turns to look at me again, a long look, with those eyes, sighs and goes on, as if she were emptying the poisoned chalice. Spoiled dog.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


People like it when you tell them things, in suitable portions, in a modest, intimate tone, and they think they know you, but they do not, they know _about_ you, for what they are let in on are facts, not feelings, not what your opinion is about anything at all, not how what has happened to you and how all the decisions you have made have turned you into who you are. What they do is they fill in with their own feelings and opinions and assumptions, and they compose a new life which has precious little to do with yours, and that lets you off the hook. No-one can touch you unless you yourself want them to.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


...the young swans as big as their parents now, but still grey and it looks peculiar, like two different species swimming in a line, alike in all their movements, and no doubt they think they are the same, while everyone can see that they are not.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


A dead dog is more quiet than a house on the steppes, a chair in a empty room.

Per Petterson

Tags: dogs silence death sad lonely emptyness



Go to quote


All my life I have longed to be alone in a place like this. Even when everything was going well, as it often did. I can say that much. That it often did. I have been lucky. But even then, for instance in the middle of an embrace and someone whispering words in my ear I wanted to hear, I could suddenly get a longing to be in a place where there was only silence. Years might go by and I did not think about it, but that does not mean that I did not long to be there. And now I am here, and it is almost exactly as I had imagined it.

Per Petterson

Tags: silence



Go to quote


But that's life. That's what you learn from; when things happen. Especially at your age. You just have to take it in and remember to think afterwards and not forget and never grow bitter.

Per Petterson

Tags: life-lessons



Go to quote


You decide for yourself when it will hurt.

Per Petterson

Tags: hurt



Go to quote


There is nothing I need from the shop, and this is not the day for social profligacy.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


But life had shifted its weight from one point to another, from one leg to the other, like a silent giant in the vast shadows against the ridge, and I did not feel like the person I had been when this day began, and I did not even know if that was something to be sorry for.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


But what I found out that summer . . . was that I could swallow whatever hit me and let it sink as if nothing had happened. So I mimicked a game that meant nothing to me now, I was going through the motions, and then it looked as if what I was doing had a purpose, but it did not.

Per Petterson


Go to quote


« first previous
Page 2 of 4.
next last »

©gutesprueche.com

Data privacy

Imprint
Contact
Wir benutzen Cookies

Diese Website verwendet Cookies, um Ihnen die bestmögliche Funktionalität bieten zu können.

OK Ich lehne Cookies ab