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21 " Words are like stories ... They change as they are passed from mouth to mouth; their meanings stretch or truncate to fit what needs to be said. "
― Pip Williams , The Dictionary of Lost Words
22 " It’s not about forgiveness, Essymay. We can’t always make the choices we’d like, but we can try to make the best of what we must settle for. Take care not to dwell. "
23 " LOSS'Sorry for your loss, they say. And I want to know what they mean, because it's not just my boys I've lost. I've lost my motherhood, my chance to be a grandmother. I've lost the easy conversation of neighbours and the comfort of family in my old age. Every day I wake to some new loss that I hadn't thought of before, and I know that soon it will be my mind.' Vivienne Blackman, 1915 "
24 " [Esme] 'And then I was born and then she [her mother Lily] died.'[Edith 'Ditte' Thompson, her godmother] 'Yes.''But when we talk about her, she comes to life.''Never forget that Esme. Words are our tools of resurrection. "
25 " I feel like a dandelion just before the wind blows. "
26 " I often wondered what kind of slip I would be written on if I was a word. Something too long, certainly. Probably the wrong colour. A scrap of paper that didn't quite fit. I worried that perhaps I would never find my place in the pigeon-holes at all. "
27 " He shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. The war has made the present more important than the past, and far more certain than the future. How I feel right now is all I can relyon. And after all that you’ve told me, I think I love you more. "
28 " The past came towards me, and I closed the book. "
29 " It struck me that we are never fully at ease when we are aware of another's gaze. Perhaps we are never fully ourselves. In the desire to please or impress, to persuade or dominate, our movements become conscious, our features set.[Esme Nicholl] "
30 " LOSS ‘Sorry for your loss, they say. And I want to know what they mean, because it’s not just my boys I’ve lost. I’ve lost my motherhood, my chance to be a grandmother. I’ve lost the easy conversation of neighbours and the comfort of family in my old age. Every day I wake to some new loss that I hadn’t thought of before, and I know that soon it will be my mind. "
31 " Stay busy--I cannot overstate the benefits of a busy day for an anxious mind or a lonely heart.[Edith 'Ditte' Thompson, in letter to Esme Nicholl Owen] "
32 " [Esme Nicholl] 'Morbs, Mabel? What does it mean?'[Mabel O'Shaughnessy] 'It's a sadness that comes and goes... I get the morbs, you get the morbs, even Miss Lizzie 'ere gets the morbs, though she'd never let on. A woman's lot, I reckon.''It must derive from morbid,' I said to myself....'I reckon it derives from grief,' said Mabel. 'From what we've lost and what we've never 'ad and never will. As I said, a woman's lot.... "
33 " She lived between the lines of the Dictionary as much as I did. "
34 " A poet, perhaps, could arrange words in a way that creates the itch of fear or the heaviness of dread. They could make an enemy of mud and damp boots and raise your pulse just at the mention of them. A poet might be able to push this word or that to mean something more than what has been ordained by our dictionary men. I am not a poet, my love. "
35 " Some words are more important than others—I learned this, growing up in the Scriptorium. But it took me a long time to understand why. "
36 " Of the Scriptorium men, Mr. Sweatman was the last to return to work. He shook Gareth's hand and took mine to kiss it.'How proud and happy your father would have been,' he said, and I held his gaze, knowing the memory of Da was stronger when it was shared.[Esme Nicholl] "
37 " Some men are very kind, and some men are not. It makes no difference whose uniform they wear. "
38 " Once the question of women’s political suffrage has been dealt with, less obvious inequalities will need to be exposed. Without realising it, you are already working for this cause. As grandfather said, it will be a long game. Play a position you are good at, and let others play theirs. "
39 " Me needlework will always be here,” she said. “I see this and I feel…well, I don’t know the word. Like I’ll always be here. "
40 " How reassuring it must be to know how you should act: like having a definition of yourself written clearly in black type. "