Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Pierce Brown

Quote by Pierce Brown

Work

Light Bringer

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Pierce Brown

Browse famous quotes and profile details for Pierce Brown. more

You May Also Like

“Son, there’s nothing right about war. Nothing good ever comes of it. And I’m no hero. Anyone who rallies for war, for so many guns in men’s hands, has never stood shivering in his boots in the middle of a battlefield. And anyone who fights simply to be a man ain’t a man. He doesn’t have enough compassion.” I start to understand then. Maybe it’s war that makes Grandpa look sad sometimes. Maybe it’s the thought that it can happen at any moment or the thought that there will always be war that makes him appear melancholy, like on those afternoons he sits stone-faced in his recliner while Hank Williams’ lonesome voice fills the house, singing of the blue whippoorwill and the weeping robin. Maybe Grandpa wants me to realize that being a soldier doesn’t make someone a hero or a man, but having compassion does.”

WarAnti War Quotes
Book:Sweet Tea & Snap Peas
Create image

“The leaderships on both sides have everyone in a trap. They too are trapped. If Palestine Authority leaders repeatedly made statements strongly condemning all violence, many of those subject to checkpoint humiliations, night raids and house demolitions might switch support to Hamas. An Israeli government ending all repression might be accused of betrayal of Zionism. Two peoples, two leaderships, a four-way entrapment. I hope there are political scientists and game theorists working out escape strategies. Meanwhile some pessimism seems hard to avoid.”

WarIsraelPalestineEntrapment
Book:Israelis and Palestinians: From the Cycle of Violence to the Conversation of Mankind
Create image

“The Bright Lights of Sarajevo After the hours that Sarajevans pass queuing with empty canisters of gas to get the refills they wheel home in prams, or queuing for the precious meagre grams of bread they’re rationed to each day, and often dodging snipers on the way, or struggling up sometimes eleven flights of stairs with water, then you’d think the nights of Sarajevo would be totally devoid of people walking streets Serb shells destroyed, but tonight in Sarajevo that’s just not the case The young go walking at stroller’s pace, black shapes impossible to mark as Muslim, Serb or Croat in such dark, in unlit streets you can’t distinguish who calls bread hjleb or hleb or calls it kruh. All take the evening air with stroller’s stride no torches guide them, but they don’t collide except as one of the flirtatious ploys when a girl’s dark shape is fancied by a boy’s. Then the tender radar of the tone of voice shows by its signals she approves his choice. Then match or lighter to a cigarette to check in her eyes if he’s made progress yet. And I see a pair who’ve certainly progressed beyond the tone of voice and match-flare test and he’s about, I think, to take her hand and lead her away from where they stand on two shell scars, where, in ‘92 Serb mortars massacred the breadshop queue and blood-dunked crusts of shredded bread lay on this pavement with the broken dead. And at their feet in holes made by the mortar that caused the massacre, now full of water from the rain that’s poured down half the day, though now even the smallest clouds have cleared away leaving the Sarajevo star-filled evening sky ideally bright and clear for bomber’s eye in those two rain-full shell-holes the boy sees fragments of the splintered Pleiades, sprinkled on those death-deep, death-dark wells splashed on the pavement by Serb mortar shells. The dark boy-shape leads dark girl-shape away to share one coffee in a candlelit café until the curfew, and he holds her hand behind AID flour-sacks refilled with sand”

WarHopeYouth
Author:Tonny Harrison
Create image

“The Bright Lights of Sarajevo After the hours that Sarajevans pass queuing with empty canisters of gas to get the refills they wheel home in prams or queuing for the precious meagre grams of bread they’re rationed to each day, and often dodging snipers on the way, or struggling up sometimes eleven flights of stairs with water, then you’d think the nights of Sarajevo would be totally devoid of people walking streets Serb shells destroyed, but tonight in Sarajevo that’s just not the case – The young go walking at stroller’s pace black shapes impossible to mark as Muslim, Serb or Croat in such dark in unlit streets you can’t distinguish who calls bread hjleb or hleb or calls it kruh. All take the evening air with stroller’s stride no torches guide them, but they don’t collide except as one of the flirtatious ploys when a girl’s dark shape is fancied by a boy’s. Then the tender radar of the tone of voice shows by its signals she approves his choice. Then match or lighter to a cigarette to check in her eyes if he’s made progress yet. And I see a pair who’ve certainly progressed beyond the tone of voice and match-flare test and he’s about, I think, to take her hand and lead her away from where they stand on two shell scars, where, in 1992 Serb mortars massacred the breadshop queue and blood-dunked crusts of shredded bread lay on this pavement with the broken dead. And at their feet in holes made by the mortar that caused the massacre, now full of water from the rain that’s poured down half the day, though now even the smallest clouds have cleared away leaving the Sarajevo star-filled evening sky ideally bright and clear for bomber’s eye in those two rain-full shell-holes the boy sees fragments of the splintered Pleiades, sprinkled on those death-deep, death-dark wells splashed on the pavement by Serb mortar shells. The dark boy-shape leads dark girl-shape away to share one coffee in a candlelit café until the curfew, and he holds her hand behind AID flour-sacks refilled with sand.”

WarHopeYouthPleiades
Author:Tonny Harrison
Create image

“Бути нейтральним оповідачем - знак привілейованого стану. Коли ти пишеш про війну в будь-якій граній країні, яким би літнім малятком ти не був, дозволити собі нейтрально потеревенити про війну, піднятися над битвою, даруйте, ти не можеш. А з часом і не захочеш. Бути упередженим оповідачем - о, це так само привілей.”

War
Book:Писати війну
Create image

“Одна з героїнь розказує про те, як вороже сприймають південці тих, хто повертався, як на всі коментарі щодо соціального і політичного життя колишні втікачі отримували риторичне питання: «Чи вам відомо, що ми тут виборювали собі свободу?»”

War
Book:Писати війну
Create image

“У Могадишо дуже багато собак - зголоднілих, покинутих, небезпечних. Одна сука народжує просто на вулиці, Джібле допомагає песиці та її цуценяті. Дуже щемка сцена: зголодніла собака, яка родить посеред війни. Та і в принципі: голодні пси на руїнах - це один із найрозповсюдженіших спосіб уявити собі війну. Але не цю війну, ну от не саме цю війну. У Могадишо не може бути зграй собак. Це мусульманське місто, місто, де діє шаріат. Мати справу з псами - означає забруднитися, осквернити себе і свій дім. У місті були пси, яких покидали немусульмани, що втікали від війни. Цих псів дуже скоро відстріляли. Фарах не може цього не знати. Але він вводить сцени зі здичавілими собаками на руїнах і з сукою, що народжує під обстрілами. Ну, бо таким є світ зайди Джібле, значить, він має реалізуватися в Могадишо - «на вимогу».”

War
Book:Писати війну
Create image