Téa Obreht, The Tiger's Wife
10 quotes
"In the end, all you want is someone to long for you when it comes time to put you in the ground."
"Believe me, Doctor, if your life ends in suddenness you will be glad it did, and if it does not you will wish it had. You will want suddenness, Doctor."
"- "I once knew a girl who loved tigers so much she almost became one herself.” Because I am little, and my love of tigers comes directly from him, I believe he is talking about me, offering me a fairy tale in which I can imagine myself—and will, for years and years."
"My grandfather would pet the dog, and, in a voice that made him sound like some kind of children's program puppet, he would say: "You're a dog! You're a dog! Where are you? You're a dog!" and the dog's tongue would drop out of its mouth and it would start keening. After a few hours of this, I said, "Jesus Grandpa, I get it, he's a dog," not knowing that, just a few years later, I would be reminding every dog I met on the street that it was a dog, and asking it where it was."
"The forty days of the soul begin on the morning after death."
"In my earliest memory, my grandfather is bald as a stone and he takes me to see the tigers."
"...fear and pain are immediate, and that, when they're gone, we're left with the concept, but not the true memory--why else...would anyone give birth more than once?"
"No matter how grave the secret, how imperative absolute silence, someone would always feel the urge to confess, and an unleashed secret is a terrible force."
"Eventually, my grandfather said: - You must understand, this is one of those moments.- What moments?- One of those moments you keep to yourself.…The story of this war… that belongs to everyone… But something like this— this is yours. It belongs only to you. And me. Only to us."
"It's a sad thing to see, because as far as I know, this man Gavo had done nothing to deserve being shot in the back of the head at his own funeral. Twice."