Quote

They gave themselves up to the stars the way swimmers can surrender to the waves, and the stars took them without resistance.

Mark Helprin

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Mark Helprin
Age: 77
Born: 1947
Born: June 28
Author
Journalist
Novelist
Writer
New York City
New York
Wave
Gave
Took
Stars
Swimmers
Without
Swimmer
Way
Waves
Resistance
Surrender

More quotes by Mark Helprin

Image
The horse could not do without Manhattan. It drew him like a magnet, like a vacuum, like oats, or a mare, or an open, never-ending, tree-lined road.
Mark Helprin
Image
I saw how greatly he suffered the requirement of being clever. It separated him from his soul, and it didn't get him anything other than a living
Mark Helprin
Image
The shelf was filled with books that were hard to read, that could devastate and remake one's soul, and that, when they were finished, had a kick like a mule.
Mark Helprin
Image
One thing you will discover is that life is based less than you think on what you’ve learned and much more than you think on what you have inside you from the beginning. Memoir From Antproof Case
Mark Helprin
Image
And they'll vote for me because I'm the best liar, because I do it honestly, with a certain finesse. They know that lies and truth are very close, and that something beautiful rests between.
Mark Helprin
Image
World War II is the war that made our world. There's no question about that. The history of all the years in which I will spend my life, every single one, that is the seminal event of the history that we will experience.
Mark Helprin
Image
We launch our souls from the cannons of art and discipline, and on any one night, hovering over the chimney tops of Europe, halfway to the stars, there are armies of brightly spinning spirits that have risen like fireworks, tethered to the souls of those men and women who, by reflection, mortification, and devotion, effortlessly outdazzle kings.
Mark Helprin
Image
Justice came from a fight amid complexities, and required all the virtues in the world merely to be perceived.
Mark Helprin
Image
Perhaps he was a fool, but he thought that if a work were truly great you would only have to read it once and you would be stolen from yourself, desperately moved, changed forever.
Mark Helprin
Image
Because there were all kinds of hell - some were black and dirty, and some were silvery and high.
Mark Helprin
Image
There is justice in the world, Peter Lake, but it cannot be had without mystery.
Mark Helprin
Image
When faced with something I fear, I tend to eat spaghetti.
Mark Helprin
Image
Heavy blizzards start as a gentle and persistent snow.
Mark Helprin
Image
I have been fighting over commas all my life.
Mark Helprin
Image
Accident is as much a part of fiction as anything else, symbolic of the grace that, along with will, conspires to put words on the page.
Mark Helprin
Image
For what can be imagined more beautiful than the sight of a perfectly just city rejoicing in justice alone.
Mark Helprin
Image
Words were all he knew they possessed and overwhelmed him, as if they were a thousand white cats with whom he shared a one-room apartment.
Mark Helprin
Image
Whatever I do I've always done not because I want something but to compensate for a loss, to bring about a balance, to create amends, to make things right.
Mark Helprin
Image
La guerre, la guerre, everything la guerre. That's how I grew up. So for me, it's real. It's not something in the past.
Mark Helprin
Image
Peter Lake had no illusions about mortality. He knew that it made everyone perfectly equal, and that the treasures of the earth were movement, courage, laughter, and love. The wealthy could not buy these things. On the contrary, they were for the taking.
Mark Helprin