WIST Quotations

Shelley, Mary Wallstonecraft -- Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus, Vol. 2, ch. 9 [The Creature] (1818)

Dave — Sat, 25 Jan 2025 22:38:25 +0000

But I now indulge in dreams of bliss that cannot be realized. What I ask of you is reasonable and moderate; I demand a creature of another sex, but as hideous as myself: the gratification is small, but it is all that I can receive, and it shall content me. It is true, we shall be monsters, cut off from all the world; but on that account we shall be more attached to one another. Our lives will not be happy, but they will be harmless, and free from the misery I now feel. Oh! my creator, make me happy; let me feel gratitude towards you for one benefit! Let me see that I excite the sympathy of some existing thing; do not deny me my request!

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797-1851) English novelist
Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus, Vol. 2, ch. 9 [The Creature] (1818)
(Source)

Barrie, James -- The Little Minister, ch. 4 “First Coming of the Egyptian Woman” (1891)

Dave — Tue, 15 Oct 2024 14:10:35 +0000

There are, I dare say, many lovers who would never have been drawn to each other had they met for the first time, as, say, they met the second time.

J. M. Barrie (1860-1937) Scottish novelist and dramatist [James Matthew Barrie]
The Little Minister, ch. 4 “First Coming of the Egyptian Woman” (1891)
(Source)

Shakespeare, William -- Comedy of Errors, Act 3, sc. 2, l. 66ff (3.2.66-69) (1594)

Dave — Mon, 24 Jun 2024 23:36:06 +0000

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE: It is thyself, mine own self’s better part,
Mine eye’s clear eye, my dear heart’s dearer heart,
My food, my fortune, and my sweet hope’s aim,
My sole Earth’s heaven, and my heaven’s claim.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Comedy of Errors, Act 3, sc. 2, l. 66ff (3.2.66-69) (1594)
(Source)

To Luciana.

Whyte, David -- “Sweet Darkness,” House of Belonging (1996)

Dave — Tue, 20 Mar 2018 13:37:48 +0000

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn

anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.

David Whyte (b. 1955) Anglo-Irish poet
“Sweet Darkness,” House of Belonging (1996)
(Source)

Peacock, Thomas Love -- “Love and Age,” From Gryll Grange (1860)

Dave — Thu, 19 Oct 2017 16:44:19 +0000

But though that first love’s impassioned blindness
Has passed away in colder light,
I still have thought of you with kindness,
And shall do, till our last goodnight.
The ever-rolling silent hours
Will bring a time we shall not know,
When our young days of gathering flowers
Will be an hundred years ago.

Thomas Love Peacock (1785-1866) English novelist, satirist, poet, merchant
“Love and Age,” From Gryll Grange (1860)
(Source)