8
" I think that thinking of our material universe, the one we perceive with our sense, as the only thing is not only foolish, it is arrogant. As well as, if I may add, in contradiction to theoretical physics. I believe — I have always believed — that there is meaning and purpose to life, although we may not understand that meaning and purpose. I think we catch glimpses of it here and there, and I honestly think that the universe communicates it to us, if we can listen for it — if our perceptions are finely enough tuned. All my life, I’ve had a strong sense of purpose, of being here for a reason that I might not at that moment understand, but that something, somewhere, understood. The times I’ve been unhappy in my life are when I’ve gone off the path, when I’ve realized that I made a choice taking me away from the way I was supposed to go. I remember what it was like to go to law school and to feel, so deeply that it went to my core, as though I was in the wrong place, as though I had stepped off the path. The path itself feels narrow and rocky, sometimes. Sometimes it feels as though I’m walking along a gulley, or a high cliff with winds. But it feels like a path, as though I’m going somewhere.
I don’t know how to talk about this except by saying that we have instincts, and our instincts tell us these things, and we have to trust them. "
― Theodora Goss
10
" I will tell you, too, that every fairy tale has a moral. The moral of my story may be that love is a constraint, as strong as any belt. And this is certainly true, which makes it a good moral. Or it may be that we are all constrained in some way, either in our bodies, or in our hearts or minds, an Empress as well as the woman who does her laundry. ... Perhaps it is that a shoemaker's daughter can bear restraint less easily than an aristocrat, that what he can bear for three years she can endure only for three days. ... Or perhaps my moral is that our desire for freedom is stronger than love or pity. That is a wicked moral, or so the Church has taught us. But I do not know which moral is the correct one. And that is also the way of a fairy tale. "
― Theodora Goss , In the Forest of Forgetting
11
" BEATRICE: Do you truly not know who he was? Mr. Dorian Gray, the lover of Mr. Oscar Wilde, who was sent to Reading Gaol for—well, for holding opinions that society does not approve of! For believing in beauty, and art, and love. What guilt and remorse he must feel, for causing the downfall of the greatest playwright of the age! It was Mr. Gray’s dissolute parties, the antics of his hedonistic friends, that exposed Mr. Wilde to scandal and opprobrium. No wonder he has fallen prey to the narcotic.
MARY: Or he could just like opium. He didn’t seem particularly remorseful, Bea.
JUSTINE: Mr. Gray is not what society deems him to be. He has been greatly misunderstood. He assures me that he had no intention of harming Mr. Wilde.
MARY: He would say that.
CATHERINE: Can we not discuss the Wilde scandal in the middle of my book? You’re going to get it banned in Boston, and such other puritanical places. "
― Theodora Goss , The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl (The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club, #3)
13
" DIANA: You never appreciate me, even when I’m being nice!
MARY: It was nice of you to defend me like that, Diana. I did appreciate it, you know. I do appreciate it, even now.
DIANA: Well, you’re my sister. I mean, you’re annoying, and you have a stick up your—Catherine doesn’t want me to say that word anymore—but you’re still my sister.
MRS. POOLE: That may be the most affectionate thing I’ve heard you say, Miss Scamp.
DIANA: Go back to your kitchen, you old (unprintable). "
― Theodora Goss , European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman (The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club, #2)
16
" Dr. Freud said he would like to see me again,” she said, finally.
“I just bet he would!” Irene laughed. “He collects beetles of all sorts, and you resemble a gray beetle that seems ordinary, but shine a light on it and it begins to shimmer like an opal—blue and green, all cool colors for you, I think. You know, when all of you had just arrived here, I admired your self-control. Here you were in a strange country, determined to rescue a woman you didn’t know from a danger you didn’t understand, all because a friend had asked you to. You were tired from a long journey, yet there you were, coolly making plans. Then later I realized it wasn’t self-control at all—it’s simply the way you are, like Sherlock. He can’t help it either. When there’s a problem to be solved, he sits down and solves it: rationally, efficiently.”
Mary opened her mouth to protest.
“I don’t mean that you’re emotionless, my dear. I just mean that your emotions are, themselves, efficient, rational. Please don’t misunderstand me—I admire you very much and I would like to be your friend. But you remind me of Sherlock more than anyone I’ve ever met.”
“I think that’s a compliment?” said Mary. “I mean, I find him dreadfully aggravating, sometimes. . . .”
“Don’t we all! "
― Theodora Goss , European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman (The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club, #2)
20
" MARY: My wrath! When do I ever get wrathful?
CATHERINE: It’s your particular kind of wrath. You don’t shout—you just get precise and icy.
MARY: That’s not wrath. I don’t think that counts as wrath.
DIANA: It’s Mary wrath. Your particular kind, as Cat said. Not that I’m scared of it, mind you. But it’s worse than being shouted at.
MARY: I have no idea what either of you are talking about. Alice, am I ever wrathful?
ALICE: Well, yes, actually. If you don’t mind my saying so, miss. When you learned what the Order of the Golden Dawn had done to me and Mr. Holmes—
CATHERINE: Oh no, you don’t! We have chapters to go before you can talk about that. Really, not one of you has any idea of narrative timing. "
― Theodora Goss , The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl (The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club, #3)
