#tragedy

The poets say some moths will do anything out of love for a flame [...] The moth takes off again, and we both step back, because he's circling at eye level now and seems to have lost rudder control, smacking into the wall on each round. He circles lower and lower, spinning around the candle in tighter revolutions, like a soap sud over an open drain. A few times he seems to touch the flame, but dances off unhurt. Then he ignites like a ball of hair, curling into an oily puff of fumes with a hiss. The candle flame flickers and dims for a moment, then burns as bright as before. Moth Smoke Lingers. ↗

— Mohsin Hamid

#insects #love #moth #smoke #star-crossed

For there has never been a story nearly as tragic as the one of Frankenstein, except for that of Johnny Heart and his Francesca Valentine. ↗

— Rae Hachton

#heartbreak #horror #horror-romance #love #paranormal-romance

We are all Romeos looking for our Juliet, but never finding her. ↗

— Rae Hachton

#love #lovers-love-story #lovers-quarrel #romance #romeo-and-juliet

For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo. ↗

— William Shakespeare

#teen-suicide #tragedy #teen

Hands that never touch. Lips that never meet. The Almost Lovers, never to be. ↗

— Rae Hachton

#heartbreak #lament #love #lovers-love-story #lovers-sadness

Every fairy tale offers the potential to surpass present limits, so in a sense the fairy tale offers you freedoms that reality denies. In all great works of fiction, regardless of the grim reality they present, there is an affirmation of life against the transience of that life, an essential defiance. The affirmation lies in the way the author takes control of reality by retelling it in his own way, thus creating a new world. Every great work of art, I would declare pompously, is a celebration, an act of insubordination against the betrayals, horrors and infidelities of life. The perfection and beauty of form rebels against the ugliness and shabiness of the subject matter. This is why we love "Madame Bovary" and cry for Emma, why we greedily read "Lolita" as our heart breaks for its small, vulgar, poetic and defiant orphaned heroine. ↗

— Azar Nafisi

#lolita #reading #reading-thinking #tehran #tragedylolita-in-tehran

Misunderstanding and distrust—the predominant elements of a novel. Without them, everyone lives happily from beginning. ↗

— Carmen DeSousa

#happy-ever-after #novel #romance #tragedy #romance-novels

It works both ways: there are victims of tragedy who come to me who have experienced grief of such magnitude that they cannot reconcile. Likewise, I cannot change the mentality of those who committed the crimes or the fools who followed them. ↗

— Paddy Ashdown

#cannot #change #come #committed #crimes

The difference between tragedy and comedy: Tragedy is something awful happening to somebody else, while comedy is something awful happening to somebody else. ↗

— Aaron Allston

#between #comedy #difference #else #happening

The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls the butterfly. ↗

— Richard Bach

#butterfly #calls #caterpillar #depth #end