Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
... but as has been said, September read often, and liked it best when words did not pretend to be simple, but put on their full armor and rode out with colors flying.
Catherynne M. Valente
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
Catherynne M. Valente
Age: 45
Born: 1979
Born: May 5
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Seattle
Washington
Cat Valente
Simple
Armor
Read
September
Words
Colors
Often
Pretend
Best
Flying
Liked
Color
Full
Rode
More quotes by Catherynne M. Valente
I will not let her speak because I love her, and when you love someone, you do not make them tell war stories. A war story is a black space. On the one side is before and on the other side is after, and what is inside belongs only to the dead.
Catherynne M. Valente
Well, very splendid and very frightening. But splendid things are often frightening. Sometimes, it's the fright that makes them splendid at all.
Catherynne M. Valente
When little ones say they want to go home, they almost never mean it. They mean they are tired of this particular game and would like to start another.
Catherynne M. Valente
I’m a monster,” said the shadow of the Marquess suddenly. “Everyone says so.” The Minotaur glanced up at her. “So are we all, dear,” said the Minotaur kindly. “The thing to decide is what kind of monster to be. The kind who builds towns or the kind who breaks them.
Catherynne M. Valente
She was not filled up with the sight of him, the way she had seen her sisters fill up, like silk balloons, like wineskins. Instead, he seemed to land heavily within her, like a black stone falling.
Catherynne M. Valente
September knew a number of curse words, most of which she heard the girls at school saying in the bathrooms, in hushed voices, as if the words could make things happen just by being spoken, as if they were fairy words, and had to be handled just so.
Catherynne M. Valente
The man who knelt before her would have sprung from her needles, even down the ghostly flecks of silver in his hair. She had not known before that she wanted all these things, that she preferred dark hair and a slightly cruel expression, that she wishes for tallness, or that a man kneeling might thrill her.
Catherynne M. Valente
After love, no one is what they were before.
Catherynne M. Valente
Hearts set about finding other hearts the moment they are born, and between them, they weave nets so frightfully strong and tight that you end up bound forever in hopeless knots, even to the shadow of a beast you knew and loved long ago.
Catherynne M. Valente
Koschei, Koschei,” she whispered. “What would I have been if I had never seen the birds? I am no one I am nothing. I am a blank paper on which you and your magic wrote a girl. Just the kind of girl you wanted, all hungry and hurt and needing. A machine for loving you. Nothing in me was not made by you.
Catherynne M. Valente
Tell it fast before you get scared and silence yourself. You'll never wish you'd held back a little more.
Catherynne M. Valente
Death stands behind every bride, every groom.
Catherynne M. Valente
It is harder, usually, to find a person who wants to walk the streets of me, to taste the teas of my country, to... immigrate, you could say.
Catherynne M. Valente
Do not ruin today with mourning tomorrow.
Catherynne M. Valente
You look like a winter night, he had told her when he had given it to her. I could sleep inside the cold of you.
Catherynne M. Valente
Woman! Come out! I have— She looked down at the bloodless grass, embarrassed. I have come to rescue you, she finally said, as if admitting that she were covered in boils.
Catherynne M. Valente
You and I, being grown-up and having lost our hearts at least twice or thrice along the way, might shut our eyes and cry out: Not that way, child! But as we have said, September was Somewhat Heartless, and felt herself reasonably safe on that road. Children always do.
Catherynne M. Valente
That’s what happens to friends, eventually. They leave you. It’s practically what they’re for.
Catherynne M. Valente
But if you must be clever, then be clever. Be brave. Sleep with fists closed and shoot straight.
Catherynne M. Valente
You will always fall in love, and it will always be like having your throat cut, just that fast.
Catherynne M. Valente