The Glimmer of Hope: Best Quotes from a Year of Reading
I read a lot, and as I go, I collect quotes that strike me — whether because they so closely match my view of the world, they introduce interesting new ideas, or they are just so exceptionally phrased. During 2019, I saved over 500 quotations from books, articles, and poems I read, and as the year winds down, I’ve culled those to 140 of my favorites. Since that’s still an awful lot of quotes, I then divided them up topically, and have shared them out in a number of posts. This last post could be considered the miscellaneous quotes that didn’t fit in elsewhere, but taken as whole they provide a bit of hope, covering themes like living intentionally, carrying on, empathy and connection, relationships, humor, and the way we see ourselves and the world. They are not all unwaveringly positive, but most allow for the possibility of some good among life’s challenges.
Empathy and Connection
Everybody here / is infirm. / Everybody here is infirm. — Gwendolyn Brooks, “Infirm”
“Once,” he said, “people believed that they lived in little boxes, boxes that contained their whole stories, and that there was no need to worry much about what other people were doing in their other little boxes, whether nearby or far away. Other people’s stories had nothing to do with ours. But then the world got smaller and all the boxes got pushed up against all the other boxes and opened up, and now that all the boxes are connected to all the other boxes, we have to understand what’s going on in all the boxes we aren’t in, otherwise we don’t know why the things happening in our boxes are happening. Everything is connected.” — Salman Rushdie, Quichotte
…And you have to remember that Edward grew up at a time when … when homosexuality was illegal. Quite apart from being socially unacceptable — at least in the circles we moved in.” “That’s ridiculous. You can’t help it if you’re gay.” “Reasonable people have always thought that.” — Penelope Lively, Passing On
Pain is the first proper step to real compassion; it can be a foundation for understanding all those who struggle with their existence. Experiencing real pain ourselves, our moral superiority comes to an end; we stop urging others to get with the program, to get their act together or to sharpen up, and start to look for the particular form of debilitation, visible or invisible that every person struggles to overcome. In pain, we suddenly find our understanding and compassion engaged as to why others may find it hard to fully participate. — David Whyte, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words
He was a heartless monster, she told him; did he not understand — O abominable one! — that human life was short and that each day of love stolen from it was a crime against life itself? — Salman Rushdie, Quichotte
Hope
Anything can happen, the tallest towers / Be overturned, those in high places daunted, / Those overlooked regarded. — Seamus Heaney, “Anything Can Happen”
As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread and the scene is not desolate. Hope is the thing that is left to us, in a bad time. I shall get up Sunday morning and wind the clock, as a contribution to order and steadfastness. Sailors have an expression about the weather: they say, the weather is a great bluffer. I guess the same is true of our human society — things can look dark, then a break shows in the clouds, and all is changed, sometimes rather suddenly. It is quite obvious that the human race has made a queer mess of life on this planet. But as a people we probably harbor seeds of goodness that have lain for a long time waiting to sprout when the conditions are right. Man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble. We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out. Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day. — E. B. White, quoted in Letters of Note, January 6, 2012
Don‘t fret, dreamy spinning ones / with water falling from your faces. / It’s us you’re waiting for and we’re coming. — Matthea Harvey, “Using a Hula Hoop Can Get You Abducted By Aliens” in If the Tabloids Are True What Are You?
You tell me you are a poet. If so, our destination is the same. / I find myself now the boatman, driving a taxi at the end of the world. / I will see that you arrive safely, my friend, I will get you there. — Carolyn Forché, “The Boatman”
blessing the boats / (at saint mary’s) / may the tide / that is entering even now / the lip of our understanding / carry you out / beyond the face of fear / may you kiss / the wind then turn from it / certain that it will / love your back / may you / open your eyes to water / water waving forever / and may you in your innocence / sail through this to that — Lucille Clifton, “blessing the boats”
Humor
She was her own Enigma Code and me and my dad were not Bletchley Park. — Jeanette Winterson, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
“Our teacher says we’re supposed to be colorblind. That’s hard to do if you can see color, isn’t it?” “Yeah, I’d say so, but I think your teacher means don’t make any assumptions based on color.” “Cross on the green and not in between.” — Paul Beatty, The White Boy Shuffle
“The system is corrupt,” a young man on a bicycle shouted, “and if it cannot be changed it must be destroyed. The mastodon revolution is here and you must all choose which side of history you want to be on.” — Salman Rushdie, Quichotte
“Ah’m uh bitch’s baby round lady people.” — Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God
is that death / stalking me / now? / no, it’s only my cat, / this / time. — Charles Bukowski, “1990 special”
Living Intentionally
When it’s over, I want to say: all my life / I was a bride married to amazement. / I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. / When it is over, I don’t want to wonder / if I have made of my life something particular, and real. / I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened, / or full of argument. / I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world. — Mary Oliver, “When Death Comes”
Please remind them that none of us have all the time we think we have in this troubled but still beautiful world. — Edwidge Danticat, The Art of Death: Writing the Final Story
The French philosopher Camus used to tell himself quietly to live to the point of tears, not as a call for maudlin sentimentality, but as an invitation to the deep privilege of belonging and the way belonging affects us, shapes us and breaks our heart at a fundamental level. — David Whyte, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words
My heart is moved by all I cannot save: / so much has been destroyed / I have to cast my lot with those / who age after age, perversely, / with no extraordinary power, / reconstitute the world. — Adrienne Rich, “Natural Resources”
to live in this world / you must be able / to do three things / to love what is mortal; / to hold it / against your bones knowing / your own life depends on it; / and, when the time comes to let it go, / to let it go — Mary Oliver, “In Blackwater Woods”
Relationships
There were three sides to a marriage: public and private and who-fucking-knows, one lived and one performed and one a thundering mystery. — Laura van den Berg, The Third Hotel
In every one of the Greeks’ mythology tales, there is this: a man chasing a woman, or a woman chasing a man. There is never a meeting in the middle. — Jesmyn Ward, Salvage the Bones
Watching you / stare into space in the tidy / rows of the vegetable garden, ostensibly / working hard while actually / doing the worst job possible, I think / you are a small irritating purple thing / and I would like to see you walk off the face of the earth / because you are all that’s wrong with my life / and I need you and I claim you. — Louise Glück, “Purple Bathing Suit”
Looking back, she supposed that had been one miracle of their marriage — even if a person was on the brink of swallowing fingernails and the other was thinking deeply about a problem they could not share, there was still someone to hold you as you wept through the night. — Laura van den Berg, The Third Hotel
Maybe that’s what it means to be in love, to willingly be at the mercy of another person. — Tayari Jones, An American Marriage
The Way We See Ourselves and the World
I can’t help it. I will / never get over making everything / such a big deal. — Ada Limón, “The Last Thing”
The day is refracted, and the next and the one after that, all of them broken up into a hundred juggled segments, each brilliant and self-contained so that the hours are no longer linear but assorted like bright sweets in a jar. — Penelope Lively, Moon Tiger
My mind, it was certain, was a well-oiled mechanism which worked swiftly and seminoiselessly. I often competed with radio contestants on quiz programs and usually won hands down in my living room. Oh, my mental machine could have excited anyone. I meant anyone interested in a person who had memorized the Presidents of the United States in chronological order, the capitals of the world, the minerals of the earth and the generic names of various species. There weren’t too many callers for those qualifications and I had to admit that I was greatly lacking in the popular attractions of physical beauty and womanly wiles. — Maya Angelou, Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas
People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character. — Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Conduct of Life
I had drunk much wine and afterward coffee and Strega and I explained, winefully, how we did not do the things we wanted to do; we never did such things. — Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
Carrying On
The two impulses cannot be separated. The desire to have a life and the desire to disappear from it. The world is unlivable and yet we live in it every day. — Laura van den Berg, The Third Hotel
Courage is what love looks like when tested by the simple everyday necessities of being alive. — David Whyte, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words
we are all happy and young and toothless / it is the same as old age / the only thing to do is simply continue / is that simple / yes, it is simple because it is the only thing to do / can you do it / yes, you can because it is the only thing to do — Frank O’Hara, “Adieu to Norman, Bon Jour to Joan and Jean-Paul”
I am trying to rekindle my feeling of fondness for the world. — George Saunders, The George Saunders Newsletter [e-mail], April 10, 2019
Just that. It is hard / in the radiance of this world to live / but we live. — Campbell McGrath, “Storm Valediction” in The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing
