Shock Quotes - Page 30

• Mister Cameron - I have read the unexpurgated Ovid, the love poems of Sappho, the Decameron in the original, and a great many texts in Greek and Latin histories that were not though fit for proper gentlemen to read, much less proper ladies. I know in precise detail what Caligula did to, and with, his sisters, and I can quote it to you in Latin or in my own translation if you wish. I am interested in historical truth, and truth in history is often unpleasant and distasteful to those of fine sensibility. I frankly doubt that you will produce anything to shock me.

  Mercedes Lackey

  Latin, Historical, Greek

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• Only one pair was still battling, apparently unaware of the new arrival. Harry saw Sirius duck Bellatrix's jet of red light: he was laughing at her. 'Come on, you can do better than that!' he yelled, his voice echoing around the cavernous room. The second jet of light hit him squarely in the chest. The laughter had not quite died from his face, but his eyes widened in shock.

  J. K. Rowling

  Laughter, Eye, Light

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• There were now and then, though rarely, the hours that brought the welcome shock, pulled down the walls and brought me back again from my wanderings to the living heart of the world. Sadly and yet deeply moved, I set myself to recall the last of these experiences. It was at a concert of lovely old music. After two of three notes of the piano the door was opened of a sudden to the other world. I sped through heaven and saw God at work. I suffered holy pains. I dropped all my defenses and was afraid of nothing in the world. I accepted all things and to all things I gave up my heart.

  Hermann Hesse

  Wall, Pain, Heart

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• But-" Maia, still looking at Alec and Magnus, broke off and rasied her eyebrows. Simon turned to see what she was looking at - and stared. Alec had his arms around Magnus and was kissing him full on the mouth. Magnus, who appeared to be in a state of shock, stood frozen. Several groups of people - Shadowhunters and Downworlders alike - were staring and whispering. Glancing to the side, Simon saw the Lightwoods, their eyes widen, gaping at the display. Maryse had her hand over her mouth. Maia looked perplexed. "Wait a second," she said. "Do we all have to do that, too?

  Cassandra Clare

  Eye, Kissing, Hands

  9 Copy quote

• God, but life is loneliness, despite all the opiates, despite the shrill tinsel gaiety of "parties" with no purpose, despite the false grinning faces we all wear. And when at last you find someone to whom you feel you can pour out your soul, you stop in shock at the words you utter - they are so rusty, so ugly, so meaningless and feeble from being kept in the small cramped dark inside you so long. Yes, there is joy, fulfillment and companionship - but the loneliness of the soul in its appalling self-consciousness is horrible and overpowering.

  Sylvia Plath

  Loneliness, Party, Grief

  Sylvia Plath (2013). “The Journals of Sylvia Plath”, p.19, Anchor

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• The nowadays ruling that no word is unprintable has, I think, done nothing whatever for beautiful letters. The boys have gone hog-wild with liberty, yet the short flat terms used over and over, both in dialogue and narrative, add neither vigor nor clarity; the effect is not of shock but of something far more dangerous — tedium.

  Dorothy Parker

  Beautiful, Thinking, Boys

  6 Copy quote

• When the emotional soul receives a wounding shock, the soul seems to recover as the body recovers. But this is only in appearance. Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul begins to make itself felt, like a bruise, which only slowly deepens its terrible ache, till it fills all the psyche. And when we think we have recovered and forgotten, it is then that the terrible after-effects have to be encountered at their worst.

  D. H. Lawrence

  Emotional, Thinking, Soul

  4 Copy quote

• It shocks me how I wish for...what is lost and cannot come back.

  Sue Monk Kidd

  Wish, Nostalgia, Lost

  Sue Monk Kidd, Ann Kidd Taylor (2009). “Traveling with Pomegranates: A Mother and Daughter Journey to the Sacred Places of Greece, Turkey, and France”, p.37, Penguin

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• So here’s where they put you. I didn’t think they even used these cells anymore.” He glanced sideways. “I got the wrong window at first. Gave your friend in the next cell something of a shock. Attractive fellow, what with the beard and the rags. Kind of reminds me of the street folk back home.

  Cassandra Clare

  Home, Thinking, Cells

  Cassandra Clare (2010). “City of Glass”, p.150, Simon and Schuster

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• If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment — assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization. This idea shocks the well-to-do, because they are convinced that the poor would not know how to use so much leisure.

  Bertrand Russell

  Philosophy, Son, Men

  "In praise of idleness: and other essays".

  50 Copy quote

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• To survive, to avert what we have termed future shock, the individual must become infinitely more adaptable and capable than ever before. We must search out totally new ways to anchor ourselves, for all the old roots - religion, nation, community, family, or profession - are now shaking under the hurricane impact of the accelerative thrust. It is no longer resources that limit decisions, it is the decision that makes the resources.

  Alvin Toffler

  Impact, Anchors, Roots

  6 Copy quote

• There you are, diligently swimming a straight line, minding the form of your strokes, when you look up and see, always a shock, the currents you can't even feel have pulled you off course.

  Julia Glass

  Swimming, Looks, Lines

  4 Copy quote

• People are always a little disconcerted when you don't recognize them, they are so important to themselves, it is a shock to discover of what small importance they are to others. [The human element]

  W. Somerset Maugham

  People, Important, Elements

  4 Copy quote

• Nothing can be sadder or more profound than to see a thousand things for the first and last time. To journey is to be born and die each minute...All the elements of life are in constant flight from us, with darkness and clarity intermingled, the vision and the eclipse; we look and hasten, reaching out our hands to clutch; every happening is a bend in the road...and suddenly we have grown old. We have a sense of shock and gathering darkness; ahead is a black doorway; the life that bore us is a flagging horse, and a veiled stranger is waiting in the shadows to unharness us.

  Victor Hugo

  Horse, Journey, Hands

  11 Copy quote

• I never trusted any man not to find someone else; to stay with me if he had another option. to not find something in me that would have him heading for the hills. that was the other reason for not thinking long-term- when someone walked out, as they invairiably did, it wasn't too big a shock. a disappointment but nothing, I hadn't been expecting.

  Dorothy Koomson

  Disappointment, Thinking, Long

  4 Copy quote

• ...people don't respect the morning. An alarm clock violently wakes them up, shatters their sleep like the blow of an ax, and they immediately surrender themselves to deadly haste. Can you tell me what kind of day can follow a beginning of such violence? What happens to people whose alarm clock daily gives them a small electric shock? Each day they become more used to violence and less used to pleasure.

  Milan Kundera

  Morning, Sleep, Blow

  5 Copy quote

• Alec had his arms around Magnus and was kissing him, full on the mouth. Magnus, who appeared to be in a state of shock, stood frozen.

  Cassandra Clare

  Kissing, Frozen, Mouths

  Cassandra Clare (2010). “Cassandra Clare: The Mortal Instrument Series (3 books): City of Bones; City of Ashes; City of Glass”, p.1151, Simon and Schuster

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• The city was bigger than its buildings, bigger than its inhabitants too. It had its own nuances. It accepted whatever came its way, the crime and the violence and the little shocks of good that crawled out from underneath the everyday.

  Colum McCann

  Cities, Everyday, Littles

  Colum McCann (2009). “Let The Great World Spin”, p.214, Bloomsbury Publishing

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• I'm the new Oberjarl." I knew it," said Halt instantly, and the other three looked at him, totally scandalized. You did?" Erak asked, his voice hollow, his eyes still showing the shock of his sudden elevation to the highest office in Skandia. Of course," said the Ranger, shrugging. "You're big, mean, and ugly and those seem to be the qualities Skandian's value most.

  John Flanagan

  Mean, Eye, Voice

  6 Copy quote

• You do care a little for me, I know... but nothing to speak of, and you don't love me. I was yours once till death if you'd cared to keep me, but I'm someone else's now... and he's mine in a way that shocks you, but why don't you stop being shocked, and attend to your own happiness.

  E. M. Forster

  Care, Littles, Way

  E M Forster (2011). “Maurice”, p.204, Hachette UK

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• Uh, the Council," I said. "Big shock, they aren't helping." Murphy looked like she might be asleep, but she snorted. "So we're on our own." Yeah." Good. It's more familiar.

  Jim Butcher

  Might, Helping, Yeah

  Jim Butcher (2010). “Changes: A Novel of the Dresden Files”, p.275, Penguin

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• I’m a little worried about Edward… Can vampires go into shock? Bella Cullen, Breaking Dawn, Chapter 7, p.129

  Stephenie Meyer

  Vampire, Dawn, Littles

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• You guys didn't really think you could go off on a party weekend without me, did you? Especially here of all places—" He froze and it was one of those rare moments when Adrian Ivashkov was caught totally and completely off guard. "Did you know," he said slowly, "that Victor Dashkov is sitting on your bed?" "Yeah," I said. "It was kind of a shock to us too.

  Richelle Mead

  Party, Weekend, Thinking

  Richelle Mead (2010). “Spirit Bound: A Vampire Academy Novel”, p.78, Penguin

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• Nobody knows much about women, not even Freud, not even women themselves. But it's like electricity: you don't need to know how it works to get a shock on the fingers.

  Carlos Ruiz Zafon

  Needs, Electricity, Fingers

  Carlos Ruiz Zafon (2005). “The Shadow of the Wind”, p.90, Penguin

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• Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial establishment would have to go on, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.

  George F. Kennan

  Military, Ocean, Government

  Foreword to 'The Pathology of Power' by Norman Cousins in 1987. "At a Century's Ending: Reflections 1982-1995". Book by George F. Kennan, p. 118, 1996.

  73 Copy quote

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