Literature sustains life because it captures death in its forward march. Clickety-clickety-clack, the wheels go round and round …

And I could have died right then. And considering how things went, I really should have.

The dead know only one thing, it is better to be alive

It was very quiet at the hotel, as if there had been a death in the family. When you have quit the Tour, nobody really knows what to say or do. (…) Everything I’d previously...

Ten years, she’s dead, and I still find myself some mornings reaching for the phone to call her. She could no more be gone than gravity or the moon.

She needs to wake up,” said Boots. “Hazard is crying. When does she wake up?” Gregor could not find it within him to give his standard reply. To pretend that in a short time Thalia...

For in grief nothing “stays put.” One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a...

If you gave someone your heart and they died, did they take it with them? Did you spend the rest of forever with a hole inside you that couldn’t be filled?

Literature is the ditch I’m going to die in. It’s still the thing I care most about.

Nobody knows how many North Koreans have died or are dying in the famine—some estimates by foreign-aid groups run as high as three million in the period from 1995 to 1998 alone—but the rotund, jowly...

A halál különben is nagyítóüveget visel, s ha hirtelen visz el valakit, a nagy sietésben rendesen ott felejti. Ez az üveg szépnek, okosnak, felülmúlhatatlannak mutatja az elköltözöttet. Lángész volt, gavallér volt. A szívek húrjait megrezegteti...

He had been, he said, an unconscionable time dying; but he hoped that they would excuse it.

It has been a week since Ami died and this morning I woke suddenly hours before dawn, indeed the same hour as when my mother died. It was not a dream that woke me, but...

Sometimes I think my scars are beautiful, but then I remember not everyone shares the same love of art.

Death is the end of our ephemeral life and beginning of infinite eternal life.

If it had only been for the immortality gene, humanity would have eventually managed to turn it back on. At one point in history, they would have embarked on a quest to become immortals, like...

The person whom you really, really love may not be here anymore. And you might be feeling lonely, but, there are people in this world who really, really love you, so shouldn’t that equal it...

My greatest fear is that, even in death, I shall never forget the pain of living.

So what did you do when death came to your house? We continued in the same way as before. What is that, a failure of the imagination? Are you in denial? This is not wholly...

He was becoming unstuck, he was sure of that – his bones were no longer wrapped in flesh but in clouds of dust, in hummingbirds, dragonflies, and luminous moths – but so perfect was his...

The main facts in human life are five: birth, food, sleep, love and death.

We are pagans. We deify each other.

All I can say is, it’s a sort of kinship, as though there is a family tree of grief. On this branch, the lost children, on this the suicided parents, here the beloved mentally ill...

Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.

He gave her a bright fake smile; so much of life was a putting off of unhappiness for another time. Nothing was ever lost by delay. He had a dim idea that perhaps if one...

Don’t risk your life for those that doesn’t love your life, lest you end up in regrets if not death.

I am the living dead girl because I am too weak to die. I hate those crying dough women on TV because they are just like me, weak and broken and clinging to the hands...

Your father was no longer a young man. he was already in his fifties.’Fifty-six,’ Eddie said blankly.Fifty-six,’ the old woman repeated. ‘His body had been weakened, the ocean had left him vulnerable, pneumonia took hold...

There is the scent too. Wonder follows it; wonder about how a boy can smell like that when he probably has no idea. He smells like the woods in the winter or the rain when...

Falling in love can be likened to someone, falling from a high building. The possible result will be unconsciousness if not death. Take it that, anybody that falls in love is either unconscious or dead.

Well-known, alas, is the case of the poor German who was very fond of three and who made each aspect of his life a thing of triads. He went home one evening and drank three...

After Death, White Smoke with Dark Silence

Harry Potter,” he said very softly. His voice might have been part of the spitting fire. “The Boy Who Lived.”None of the Death Eaters moved. They were waiting. Everything was waiting. Hagrid was struggling, and...

And now I am sitting in the graveyard, staring at two headstones, and feeling good and bad at the same time. The way we do when our own lives continue to unfold, but the lives...

Miss Mary Mack, Mack, Mack, all dressed in black, black, black. She has a knife, knife, knife, stuck in her back, back, back. She cannot breathe, breathe, breathe. She cannot cry, cry, cry. Thats why...

Then I heard your voice as clear as day, And you told me I should concentrate, It was all so strange, And so surreal, That a ghost should be so practical. Only if for a...

Time goes on, and your life is still there, and you have to live it. After a while you remember the good things more often than the bad. Then, gradually, the empty silent parts of...

Just as when we come into the world, when we die we are afraid of the unknown. But the fear is something from within us that has nothing to do with reality. Dying is like...

Just remember, what the French say. No, probably not the French, they’ve got a president or something. The Brits, maybe, or the Swedes. You know what I mean?””No, Matthew. What do they say?””The king is...

A world without pain, loss, betrayal, hate, death, loneliness? Impossible!

When something horrible happens, it’s human nature to want to blame it on someone. We want someone to be held accountable, even though sometimes things just happen.

I lay awake listening to the rain, and at first it was as pleasant to my ear and my mind as it had long been desired; but before I fell asleep it had become a...

The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.

Death is not an evil, because it frees us from all evils, and while it takes away good things, it takes away also the desire for them. Old age is the supreme evil, because it...

So that’s it. That’s the big secret. I tried to kill myself on New Year’s eve. Just like Sadie did last night. Only she really did it. I don’t know all the detatils, just the...

The women in your family have never lost touch with one another. Death is a path we take to meet on the other side.

We all didn’t come into to the world at the same time so it makes sense that we don’t leave it at the same time.

To inspire is to give life. To expire is to give death.

I am an infidel today. I do not believe what has been served to me to believe. I am a doubter, a questioner, a skeptic. When it can be proved to me that there is...

Mientras cubría la distancia entre Sant Berger y mi casa, sentí que la negrura de la noche iba tiñendo mi alma. Sin que pudiera explicármelo, un malestar había empezado a roerme desde dentro como una...