WIST Quotations

Anderson, Robert -- I Never Sang for My Father, Act 2, Closing Monologue [Gene] (1968)

Dave — Wed, 24 Aug 2022 19:19:23 +0000

Death ends a life … but it does not end a relationship, which struggles on in the survivor’s mind … toward some resolution, which it never finds.

Robert Anderson (1917-2009) American playwright, screenwriter, theater producer
I Never Sang for My Father, Act 2, Closing Monologue [Gene] (1968)
(Source)

(Ellipses in original.) The line is also given at the beginning of Act 1, where it reads:

Death ends a life, but it does not end a relationship, which struggles on in the survivor's mind towards some final resolution, some clear meaning, which it perhaps never finds.

In the 1970 adaptation Anderson made for film, the line is given as "which it may never find."

Shakespeare, William -- All’s Well That Ends Well, Act 1, sc. 1, l. 57ff (1.1.57-58) (1602?)

Dave — Mon, 26 Oct 2015 14:06:50 +0000

LAFEW: Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead,
excessive grief the enemy to the living.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
All’s Well That Ends Well, Act 1, sc. 1, l. 57ff (1.1.57-58) (1602?)
(Source)

Millay, Edna St. Vincent -- Sonnet 2: “Time does not bring relief,” Renascence: and Other Poems (1917)

Dave — Thu, 26 Feb 2015 16:39:08 +0000

Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year’s bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!
There are a hundred places where I fear
To go, — so with his memory they brim!
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, “There is no memory of him here!”
And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) American poet
Sonnet 2: “Time does not bring relief,” Renascence: and Other Poems (1917)
(Source)

The sonnets were not originally numbered, nor did they include titles. Later collections with this poem reduced the number of exclamation points (e.g.).

Mann, Thomas -- The Magic Mountain (1924)

Dave — Thu, 19 Feb 2015 14:50:24 +0000

A man’s dying is more the survivors’ affair than his own.

Thomas Mann (1875-1955) German writer, critic, philanthropist, Nobel laureate [Paul Thomas Mann]
The Magic Mountain (1924)