#sentence

My lifelong involvement with Mrs Dempster began at 5:58 o'clock p.m. on 27 December 1908, at which time I was ten years and seven months old. ↗

— Robertson Davies

#business

For my own part, I was much occupied in learning to ride the bicycle, and busy upon a series of papers discussing the probable developments of moral ideas as civilization progressed. ↗

— H.G. Wells

#the-war-of-the-worlds #business

And now -- now it only remains for me to light a cigarette and go home. Dear God, only now am I remembering that people die. Does that include me? Don't forget, in the meantime, that this is the season for strawberries. Yes. ↗

— Clarice Lispector

#last-sentence #the-hour-of-the-star #death

I would prove to you that being different isn't a death sentence but a call to arms. ↗

— Jodi Picoult

#death-sentence #different #death

If every life is a river, then it's little wonder that we do not even notice the changes that occur until we are far out in the darkest sea. One day you look around and nothing is familiar, not even your own face. My name once meant daughter, grandaughter, friend, sister, beloved. Now those words mean only what their letters spell out; Star in the night sky. Truth in the darkness. I have crossed over to a place where I never thought I'd be. I am someone I would have never imagined. A secret. A dream. I am this, body and soul. Burn me. Drown me. Tell me lies. I will still be who I am. ↗

— Alice Hoffman

#inspirational #change

The way other people fantasize about surprise inheritances, firts-glance love, and endless white empyreal pastures, Mitchell dreamed of an erupting supervolcano that would bury North America under a foot of hot ash. ↗

— Nathaniel Rich

#dreams

Deep down, no one really believes they have a right to live. But this death sentence generally stays tucked away, hidden beneath the difficulty of living. If that difficulty is removed from time to time, death is suddenly there, unintelligibly. ↗

— Jean Baudrillard

#believes #beneath #death #deep #deep down

When I came back to Dublin I was courtmartialed in my absence and sentenced to death in my absence, so I said they could shoot me in my absence. ↗

— Brendan Behan

#back #came #could #death #dublin

When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow. ↗

— Harper Lee

#first-sentence

It was almost December, and Jonas was beginning to be frightened. ↗

— Lois Lowry

#opening-lines #first-sentence