01UndatedMemory, I must suppose, if it is neglected becomes like a box room, or a lumber room in an old house, the contents jumbled about, maybe not only from neglect but also from too much haphazard searching in them, and things to boot thrown in that don't belong there.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
02UndatedAnd be thinking, remembering. Trying to. All difficult dark stuff, stories stuffed away, like old socks into old pillowcases. Not quite knowing the weight of truth in them much more. And things that I have let be a long time in the interests of happiness, or at least that daily contentment that I was once I do believe mistress ofSebastian Barry / quote ↗
03UndatedThere are some sufferings that we seem as a creature to forget, or we would never survive as a creature among all the other creatures.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
04UndatedIf it had been a great necessity, if it had been contingents of an army meeting to overwhelm the enemy by stealth, it might not have worked out so neatly. But fate it would seem is a perfect strategist and will work miracles of timing to assist our destruction.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
05UndatedIt was an earthquake, tearing at the sons of America, trying to swallow them up. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful sons, that women had reared, had kissed and screamed at, and that fathers had stared intently in their cots, to see themselves in the wondrous mirrors of their babies.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
06UndatedThe thing itself, the first thing, will never do us alone, we must be elaborating, improving, poeticising.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
07UndatedEverything bad gets shot at in America, says John Cole, and everything good too.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
08UndatedHis people had hogs there till the bottom fell out of hogs. The bottom was always falling out of something in America far as I could see. So it was with the world, restless, kind of brutal. Always going on. Not waiting for no man.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
09UndatedThe bottom was always falling out of something in America far as I could see.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
10UndatedFor I did not want him to see, or to question me, for here contains already secrets, and my secrets are my fortune and my sanity.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
12UndatedI am dwelling on things I love, even if a measure of tragedy is stitched into everything, if you follow the thread long enoughSebastian Barry / quote ↗
13UndatedBecause it strikes me there is something greater than judgement. I think it is called mercy.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
14UndatedIn the darkness as we lie side by side John Cole's left hand snakes over under the sheets and takes a hold of my right hand. We listen to the cries of the night revellers outside and hear the horses tramping along the ways. We're holding hands then like lovers who have just met or how we imagine lovers might be in the unknown realm where lovers act as lovers without concealment.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
15UndatedI knew immediately something was terribly wrong, but you can know that and not allow the thought in your head, at the front of your head. It dances around at the back, where it can't be controlled. But the front of the head is where the pain begins.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
16UndatedThere is such solace in the mere sight of water. It clothes us delicately in its blowing salt and scent, gossamer items that medicate the poor soulSebastian Barry / quote ↗
17UndatedHow is that for some people drinking is a short-term loan on the spirit, but for others a heavy mortgage on the soul?Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
18UndatedI am cold, even though the heat of early summer is adequate. I am cold because I cannot find my heart.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
19UndatedIt’s a dark thing when the world sets no value on you and your kin, and then Death comes stalking in, in his bloody boots”.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
20UndatedThis (white settlers) was the section of humanity that was favored in that place, the Indians had no place no more there. Their tickets of passage were rescinded and the bailiffs of God took back the papers of their soles.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
21UndatedClinton and his cigar was so much greater a man than Bush and his rifle.Sebastian Barry / quote ↗
