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A Quotes

Browse famous quotes beginning with A. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.

All A Quotes

“Andre mounted the wagon, stood on the coffin, removed his hat, ad lowered his shirt collar. 'It will be but a momentary pang,,' Dr. James Thacher heard him say. Seizing the nose, Andre brought it over his head, tied a knot under his left ear, and placed a handkerchief over his eyes.”

BraveryAmerican HistoryAmerican RevolutionMilitary QuoteHangingJohn Andre
Author:Nancy Rubin Stuart
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“Andrea is coming to pick me up in about thirty minutes to head to her folks' house for Thanksgiving. I've got buttery yeast rolls from Aimee's mom's old family recipe, my cranberry sauce with port and dried cherries, and a batch of spicy molasses cookies sandwiched with vanilla mascarpone frosting. I also have the makings for dried shisito peppers, which I will make there. Andrea's mom, Jasmin, is making turkey and ham, and braised broccoli and an apple pie, Andrea is doing a potato and celery root mash and a hilarious Jell-O mold that contains orange sherbet and canned mandarin oranges and mini marshmallows, and her dad, Gene, is making his mother's candied yams and sausage corn bread stuffing. Benji is cooking and serving most of the day at the group home where he grew up, and will come join us for dessert, bringing his chocolate pecan pie with bourbon whipped cream.”

Best FriendsDessertsThanksgiving DinnerJenna Stewart
Author:Stacey Ballis
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“Andrea turned her back to Desandra and rolled her eyes. Raphael grimaced. They both looked scandalized. Dear God, what could she have said to scandalize a bouda... “No, really!” Desandra nodded. “Okay, so most guys don’t have a nice ball sack, right? It looks all hairy and wrinkled like some small animal died between their legs, but Gerardo’s is like two plums in a velvet bag...” Derek, who’d been lingering in the doorway, took a careful step to the left behind the wall and disappeared from my view. Kill me, somebody. I raised my hand. “Hold that thought. I need to borrow Andrea for a minute.” I grabbed her arm and pulled her into the hallway. Behind us Raphael growled, “Don’t leave me!” Andrea leaned towards me. “Plums.” “Listen...” Andrea raised her hands, imitating holding plums the size of small coconuts, and moved them up and down.”

RaphaelKate DanielsAndrea Nash
Author:Ilona Andrews
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“Andreas Ban would like to put several swifts on his chest to rest, to breathe with him like sleeping children. Little black birds like cheerful death. Painless. Little black birds with big eyes and a small beak, which peck noiselessly at his insides, see what is there and are silent. Andreas Ban stretches his arms toward the sky, imagining that he is flying, imagining himself in a flock of swifts and lets out a stifled cry. Small birds, they die when they are alone. He, Andreas Ban, is alone.”

DeathSadnessMortalityBirds
Author:Daša Drndić
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“Andreas -Bir keresinde, bir bayram sabahı kentin sokaklarından akan kanları görmüştüm, yağmur suları gibi yolun kıyısından usulca akıyorlardı ne var ki yağmur suyu değildi. Şehrin dört bir yanında insanlar tanrılarına kurbanlar kesiyorlardı. İşte o zaman anladım ki her yıl dört gün boyunca kutlanan bu bayram ilkel toplumlarda tanrılara kurban verilen ritüellerden başka bir şey değildi. İlyada’da ve Odysseus’da Homeros’un anlattığı türden yani... Hatta aztekler bu işi insan kurban verdirmeye kadar götürmüşler, düpedüz insan, bildiğimiz insan...rivayet odur ki bizde bu durumu engellemek için koçlar ihsan eylenmiş. Birbirimizi kesmeyelim diye yani, en azından bu sebeple. Bunu birisine anlatmak istedim, yıllardır bayram diye kutladığınız bu şey çok ilkel bir ritüel esasen, neyin bayramı bu diye, ilk insanlarda bu işleri böyle yapardı falan filan. Anlattım da, yüzünde bir türlü anlam veremediğim bir yarım tebessümle beni dinleyen bir tezgahtara, gülümsemesi beni anladığını ve onun için üzerinde düşünmeye değer bir şey söylediğimi mi gösteriyordu yoksa alışverişimi bitirip gidene kadar hoş tutması gereken sabırla dinlemesi gereken biri miydim onun için anlayamadım. O gün keşfettim dünyayı anlamak onu değiştirmeye yetmiyordu. Evet bu bir keşif, ben icat etmedim.”

Bayram
Author:Georg Büchner
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“Andrei always thought there was a fundamental eeriness to names. If a name had an adorable ring to it, like Bonnie or Milo, it was cute to say and hard to be angry at a Bonnie for long. People treated others the way their names sounded. If someone’s name was common, people would mostly see neutral characters—shy, kind, or good-natured. If one’s name was unusual, people had lazier associations and treated them as either a spectacle or an artist. If their name was a title commanding presence, the world’s reaction to them, however subtle, would naturally endow them with a confidence as easily handed to them as their name.”

PhilosophyNamesSocietyIdentityPerspectiveFriendshipsNamePersonhood
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei avoided the internet as well and this evasion only added to his gloom. He loved music, especially old songs, and he loved movies, of all sorts. If he had the patience, sometimes he would read. While most of the pages he turned bored him to sleep, certain books with certain lines disarranged him. Some literature brought him to his feet, laughing and howling in his room. When the book was right, it was bliss and he wept. His room hushed with serenity and indebtedness. When he turned to his computer, however, or took out his phone, he would inevitably come across a viral trend or video that took the art he loved and turned it into a joke. The internet, in Andrei’s desperate eyes, managed to make fun of everything serious. And if one did not laugh, they were not intelligent. The internet could not be slowed and no protest to criticize its exploitation of art could be made because recreations of art hid perfectly under the veneer of mockery and was thus, impenetrable. It was easy to use Chopin’s ‘Sonata No. 2’ for a quick laugh, to reduce the ‘Funeral March’ to background music. It was a sneaky way for a digital creator to be considered an artist—and parodying the classics made them appear cleverer than the original artist. Meanwhile, Andrei’s body had healed playing Chopin alone in his apartment. He would frailly replay movie moments, too, that he later found the world edited and ripped apart with its cheap teeth. And everyone ate the internet’s crumbs. This cruel derision was impossible to escape. But enough jokes, memes, and glam over someone’s precious source of life would eventually make a sensitive body numb. And Andrei was afraid of that. He needed his fountain of hope unblemished. For this reason, he escaped the internet’s claws and only surrendered to it for e-mails, navigation, and the weather.”

ArtInspirationSadnessLonelinessInternetSocial MediaVulnerabilityAdulthoodSensitivityNumbness
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei could not guess how long the patient had been in this condition. For all he knew, the patient might not have known that smartphones existed, who the president was, or that the pandemic had even occurred. Andrei contemplated the brother’s state—and imagined a mind sinking down an infinite well of scattered thoughts and gloom. He speculated the likely craze one would result to from being imprisoned inside a room, isolated from all things and all people for years. The man had no choice but to stare at the ceiling and listen to a machine that breathed for him. He could not taste the flavor of fruit, of beer, of cheese, or any delight to the tongue. He would not know temperature. He could not scratch himself nor could he ask to be scratched. He must have lost count of the days and not know if it was a Thursday in April or Sunday in May. If a nurse said something to him, he was forfeited the human naturality to respond. If a nurse hurt him, he could not protect himself. He had memories, but no friend to create more with.”

LonelinessHospitalsComaComatoseBrain InjuryTraumatic Brain InjurySubacute Care
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei felt that this day with Raphael, while short-lived, was the equivalent of being Raphael’s friend for many, many years. Nothing could, of course, replace time devoted to another. They would have enjoyed drinking in the desert, taking a road trip to Arizona, a good street fight or two—though this required time which they did not have. But in an immeasurable sense, one true conversation and a friendship were the same. The heart asked its only ever test: Did you give me away? Ah, good. The correspondence of souls begged for existence and never for “longer.” Raphael’s departure did not depress Andrei, but immortally fed him. He may not have Raphael to speak with, and Raphael may not have Andrei to sit down and talk to, but they had spoken. Given. Lagers in the desert, the fantasy of an Arizona escapade, and bar brawls were already offered between their looks, heart allowance, and exchange of truth. Certainly, one wants those years, but they don’t need them. That’s the beauty of the real. There was no such thing as “enough” of someone or “more” or “less”—there were only happenings.”

RomanceFriendshipFriendsConnectionBrotherhoodLove At First SightGrowing OldMissing Someone
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei looked down at the wet sand and watched the waves advance closer to the land then fall backward. Each proposal, the water took a new shape, like the varying flame of the candles back at the church. The ocean approached him briefly, saluted, and retired in casual speed. Its transient withdrawal marked different contours on the earth, spreading its foam in this place and that. And there it was, the universe showing mankind once again that nothing belongs. People go, places change, and time continues. All they had were their moments. And some of those moments turned into memories. And some of those memories hurt. And depending on whatever the pain was, that was what differentiated one person from another.”

PainHumanityMemoriesSadnessMankindIdentityLetting GoHeartbreakGrowing OldMissing Someone
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei perched on the rooftop of the cinema and looked out at Westwood’s nightlife bustling before him. He was mounted on the single, cream, stoned gargoyle built above in the corner of the theatre. He and his gothic animal breathed under the cold moon. Yes. He always felt like the moon—generally unnoticed by the world, that never minds—and navigated richly through his life alone and uninterrupted, like a ghost. Truth is an unobvious color. Those who attempt truth will never make billboards or conversations but usually sift in the background in awkward veritas.”

CharacterTruthHumanitySocietyLonelinessIdentitySolitudeGhostsMasculinityVeritas
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei rested on a bench directly in front of a grave that belonged to: 'A father, hard worker, and beloved friend.' He leaned back, resting in the cemetery, and with each second, his desire to know more about this man 'Yeah, he’s a father, hard worker, and beloved friend. Weren’t we all at some point? What’s his kink? The worst thing he’s done to a person? The greatest thing he’s good at?' he thought. That’s what Andrei wanted to know. Not titles the man himself would disapprove of. What good was a proper impression in a cemetery filled with thousands of proper impressions? One must be indecent. So Andrei closed his eyes and imagined the father who worked hard and was a beloved friend. Maybe his kink was that he needed to do it in public—in the restroom after a date or at church during mass. Maybe the worst thing he had ever done was work so hard for his family that he never once saw them. Maybe the best thing he was good at was giving gifts to his friends. Yes, that’s it. He never gave money or handed them gift cards, but instead gave his brothers exactly what filled them the most. One year, he gave a notebook to his buddy John with the same line written over and over in painful cursive. The line said: 'Happy Birthday, you get thirteen hours of my life' and repeated until you could see the traces of hand cramps squiggling for life on the forty-second page. 'What a good man,' imagined Andrei. 'Hell of a mate.”

DeathGriefSocietyMourningFatherhoodMemorialMissing SomeoneBurialObituaryLosing Someone
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei sometimes wondered how much a river would change Los Angeles. He pictured a long stream of water that divided the city, much like the River Thames or the Seine. Rivers nourished. The water happily rewrote the aisles of streetlamps and transformed one’s nighttime walk into a feature film. It carried boats filled with a surveying crowd that waved back at any brandishing hand on land that tried. It fostered lunch dates, amusing dares, and a reference for the lost. Andrei had spent one summer abroad and met these rivers. He was astonished at the difference in conversations the Europeans had with him. They were simple and alive. The pubs helped. The accents, too. Was it the rain that reminded? he speculated. The museums? The red buses? The cheap flights to any neighboring country? So—what was it about the geography of LA that made connection impossible? Just then, the sun glared at him. He glared back.”

SocietyLonelinessEuropeRiversLondonFranceCaliforniaLos AngelesRiver ThamesRiver Seine
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei understood people were social animals who needed others to survive, but arguments that used biological outlines of life always creeped him out. He did not want to consider himself a thing that needed to gather in a group, or regard other evolutionary facts of his species, like needing to procreate or choosing a partner to make one feel safe. No. There were things he could choose between, like Earl Grey or jasmine green tea, children or no children, or having any friends at all.”

PeopleLifeFreedomSocietyIdentitySurvivalChoiceBiologyFreewill
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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“Andrei was in an elusive period in life, much like a snow leopard. He’d spent a couple of years having successfully filtered out all that was terrible and ugly in his life, from old shoes to lifeless people. However, the purification finished and he had not yet found the glint of gold to replace the damned. He had nowhere to place his lifted foot. Instead, his moral foot hovered, awkwardly, a crepuscular flesh, trembling every night, unable to set itself in a correct place. He lived in that hanging imbalance every day, and some would say this period of searching takes a while. But to him, all it did was take. Not a while. The peace of his life just takes. And takes. And takes. While Andrei may not suffer from the heat of stress or common negativity that improperly placed feet do, he lived cold, in a void, without the luxury of finding a worthy arrangement for his leopard paw.”

SuccessGrowing UpSadnessSocietyLonelinessIdentityBoredomAdulthoodFriendshipsToxicity
Author:Karl Kristian Flores
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