“It has long been a tradition among novel writers that a book must end by everybody getting just what they wanted, or if the conventional happy ending was impossible, then it must be a tragedy in which one or both should die. In real life very few of us get what we want, our tragedies don't kill us, but we go on living them year after year, carrying them with us like a scar on an old wound.” IfsWantShouldWritingYearsLongBookRealEndsWantedDiesNovelImpossibleGoes OnTraditionTragedyWoundsReal LifeScarConventionalHappy EndingsOld Wounds Author:Willa Cather
“Even though they (women) grow weary and wear themselves out with child-bearing, it does not matter; let them go on bearing children till they die, that is what they are there for.” ChildrenDoeMatterDiesGrowsGoes OnWeary Author:Martin Luther
“You cannot be born and you cannot die. You will exist in a universe that goes on forever. That is the ultimate horror from the Zen point of view. You could be unhappy forever.” SufferingDiesUniverseBornViewsForeverGoes OnHorrorUltimatePoint Of ViewUnhappy Author:Frederick Lenz
“At the sight of what goes on in the world, the most misanthropic of men must end by being amused, and Heraclitus must die laughing.” MenWorldEndsDiesLaughingGoes OnSightAmusementAmusedMisanthropic Author:Nicolas Chamfort
“I have to go on writing because I wouldn't be able to go on without writing. It is the only function that works for me, and without that function, I would die.” WritingAbleDiesGoes OnFunctionObsession Author:Farley Mowat
“Maybe you had to be dying to finally get to do what you wanted.I fidgeted around with the puzzle pieces for a while longer, but I wasn't lucky. Nothing seemed to fit without a whole lot of work.Then I had this thought: What if it was enough to realize that you would die someday, that none of this would go on forever? Would that be enough?” IfsEnoughWholeWantedDiesRealizingForeverPiecesDyingGoes OnFitLuckySomedayWhat IfPuzzlesPuzzle Piece Book:Tell the Wolves I'm Home Source: Tell the Wolves I'm Home
“Widows tend either to fade away when husbands die, committing emotional suttee, or else find that a new life burgeons. Here in Christchurch, a lot of burgeoning goes on.” DiesEmotionalGoes OnHusbandFadesNew LifeWidowsFade Away Author:Fay Weldon
“Ah, my brother, it is a far harder thing, and it is afar higher proof of a thorough-going, persistent, Christian principle woven into the very texture of my soul, to go on plodding and patient, never taken by surprise by any small temptation, than to gather into myself the strength which God has given me, and, expecting some great storm to come down upon me, to stand fast, and let it rage. It is a great deal easier to die once for Christ than to live always for Him.” SoulChristianDiesGivenChristDealsPrinciplesTakenBrotherGoes OnHigherEasierHarderSurprisePatientStormProofRageTemptationMy SoulMy BrotherExpectingPersistentTextureWovenThoroughAfar Author:Alexander MacLaren
“Be sure the safest rule is that we should not dare to live in any scene in which we dare not die. But, once realise what the true object is in life that it is not pleasure, not knowledge, not even fame itself, 'that last infirmity of noble minds' but that it is the development of character, the rising to a higher, nobler, purer standard, the building-up of the perfect Man and then, so long as we feel that this is going on, and will (we trust) go on for evermore, death has for us no terror; it is not a shadow, but a light; not an end, but a beginning!” MenFeelsShouldMindLongEndsCharacterLightLastsDeathDiesPerfectPleasureObjectsBuildingGoes OnDevelopmentHigherSceneFameStandardsShadowTerrorDareNobleRisingRealisingInfirmityBuilding UpPerfect ManEvermore Book:Delphi Complete Works of Lewis Carroll (Illustrated) Source: Delphi Complete Works of Lewis Carroll (Illustrated)
“I have got this letter which actually goes out the day after I die. It has already been written. And it says that: "Yesterday I died". And then it says: "That's bad news for me, but it's not bad news for you, the shareholders of Berkshire". And then I go on and explain what is going to happen. I know that is one time when they will be really interested in hearing from me.” KnowsHappensDiesWrittenGoes OnNewsLettersDiedHearingYesterdayOne TimeBad NewsShareholders Author:Warren Buffett
“When I look at small things, I think I shall go on living: drops of rain, leather gloves shrunk by being wet... When I look at something too big, I want to die: the Diet Building, or a map of the world.” ThinkingWorldWantLooksBigsDiesBuildingGoes OnRainDietsMapsWetSmall ThingsLeatherGlovesWanting To DieI Want To Die Author:Kobo Abe
“Stone crumbles. Wood rots. People, well they die. But things as fragile as a thought, a dream, a legend, they can go on and on.” PeopleWellsDreamDiesGoes OnStonesWoodsLegendsFragileUnreal Book:Choke: A Novel Source: Choke: A Novel
“In giving our daughter life, her father and I had also given her death, something I hadn't realized until that new creature flailed her arms in what was now infinite space. We had given her disease and speeding cars and flying cornices: once out of the fortress that had been myself, she would never be safe again ... We disappoint our kids and they disappoint us, and sometimes they grow up into people we don't like very much. We go on loving, though what we love may be more memory than actuality. And until the day we die we fear the phone that rings in the middle of the night.” PeopleGivingMaySometimesKidsNightDiesFatherGivenGrowsMemoriesSpaceGrowing UpMiddleCarArmsGoes OnSafeCreaturesDiseaseDaughterInfinitePhonesRingsFlyingDisappointMiddle Of The NightOur DaughterActualityFortressesSpeedingInfinite SpaceSpeeding Cars Author:Mary Cantwell
“Go on, now, go. Walk out the door. Just turn around now, 'cause you're not welcome anymore. Weren't you the one who tried to hurt me with 'goodbye?' Did you think I'd crumble? Did you think I'd lay down and die? I will survive.” ThinkingDiesTurnsCausesHurtWalksDoorsGoes OnDown AndLaysWelcomeGoodbyeHurt Me Author:Gloria Gaynor
“Knowing what [Christ] knew , knowing all about mankind--ah! who would have thought that the crime is not so much to make others die, but to die oneself--confronted day and night with his innocent crime, it became too difficult to go on. It was better to get it over with, to not defend himself, to die, in order not to be the only one to have survived, and to go elsewhere, where, perhaps, he would be supported.” GodWould BeNightOrderDiesDifficultChristKnowingMankindCrimeGoes OnGuiltOneselfInnocentInnocenceElsewhereSurvivedDay And Night Author:Albert Camus
“But already it is time to depart, for me to die, for you to go on living; which of us takes the better course, is concealed from anyone except God.” GodDiesCoursesGoes OnConcealed Author:Socrates
“[I have] been in love with one princess or another almost all my life, and I hope I shall go on so, till I die, being firmly persuaded, that if ever I do a mean action, it must be in some interval betwixt one passion and another.” IfsMenMeanHas BeensActionMotivationDiesPassionGoes OnMen And WomenPrincessIntervalsBeen In Love Author:Laurence Sterne
“My characters never die screaming in rage. They attempt to pull themselves back together and go on. And that's basically a conservative view of life.” CharacterTogetherDiesViewsGoes OnSurvivalConservativeRageScreamConservatismBack Together Author:Jane Smiley
“It seems to me a purely lyric poet gives himself, right down to his sex, to his mood, utterly and abandonedly, whirls himself roundtill he spontaneously combusts into verse. He has nothing that goes on, no passion, only a few intense moods, separate like odd stars, and when each has burned away, he must die.” GivingSeemsPoetryDiesPassionStarsSexPoetGoes OnMoodIntenseOddBurnedVerses Author:D. H. Lawrence