45
" Once there was a boy,” said Jace.
Clary interrupted immediately. “A Shadowhunter boy?”
“Of course.” For a moment a bleak amusement colored his voice. Then it was gone. “When the boy was six years old, his father gave him a falcon to train. Falcons are raptors – killing birds, his father told him, the Shadowhunters of the sky.
“The falcon didn’t like the boy, and the boy didn’t like it, either. Its sharp beak made him nervous, and its bright eyes always seemed to be watching him. It would slash at him with beak and talons when he came near: For weeks his wrists and hands were always bleeding. He didn’t know it, but his father had selected a falcon that had lived in the wild for over a year, and thus was nearly impossible to tame. But the boy tried, because his father told him to make the falcon obedient, and he wanted to please his father.
“He stayed with the falcon constantly, keeping it awake by talking to it and even playing music to it, because a tired bird was meant to be easier to tame. He learned the equipment: the jesses, the hood, the brail, the leash that bound the bird to his wrist. He was meant to keep the falcon blind, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it – instead he tried to sit where the bird could see him as he touched and stroked its wings, willing it to trust him. Hee fed it from his hand, and at first it would not eat. Later it ate so savagely that its beak cut the skin of his palm. But the boy was glad, because it was progress, and because he wanted the bird to know him, even if the bird had to consume his blood to make that happen.
“He began to see that the falcon was beautiful, that its slim wings were built for the speed of flight, that it was strong and swift, fierce and gentle. When it dived to the ground, it moved like likght. When it learned to circle and come to his wrist, he neary shouted with delight Sometimes the bird would hope to his shoulder and put its beak in his hair. He knew his falcon loved him, and when he was certain it was not just tamed but perfectly tamed, he went to his father and showed him what he had done, expecting him to be proud.
“Instead his father took the bird, now tame and trusting, in his hands and broke its neck. ‘I told you to make it obedient,’ his father said, and dropped the falcon’s lifeless body to the ground. ‘Instead, you taught it to love you. Falcons are not meant to be loving pets: They are fierce and wild, savage and cruel. This bird was not tamed; it was broken.’
“Later, when his father left him, the boy cried over his pet, until eventually his father sent a servant to take the body of the bird away and bury it. The boy never cried again, and he never forgot what he’d learned: that to love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed. "
― Cassandra Clare , City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, #1)
48
" I’ve never liked the term ‘actor’.” Barron spoke slowly, joining hands with the cast members to his left and right. The rest of them formed a circle, also holding hands, and he continued. “Seriously now, is anyone here ‘acting’? Is anyone here pretending? “Me, I’m a theater director. One hundred percent, all the time. I’m not pretending, or acting, or trying to fool anyone. This is what I do, and I give it my all—just like you. I look around me, and I don’t see a single phony. I see people who give their hearts, their minds, and their very lives to being serious performers on the stage. In the last weeks I’ve watched every one of you give up the easy life to come here and bust a gut to make this show a reality. “That’s why I call you performers. Not actors—performers. Because when it’s time to prepare, you work out every nuance of a role. When it’s time to step in front of the crowd, you reach out and pull them in with both hands. When it’s time to say your lines, you deliver them with skill and meaning. That’s performance. And there’s nothing phony about that. There’s nothing pretend about that. There’s no acting that will take the place of that. “And so that’s my wish for you tonight: Have a great performance. You’ve done the work, you’re ready, and now it’s time to show off. Have fun out there, gang. Perform.” --Jerome Barron's opening night pep talk to the cast of Death Troupe "
52
" The soldiers had been entrenched in their positions for several weeks but there was little, if any fighting, except for the dozen rounds they ritually exchanged every day. The weather was extremely pleasant. The air was heavy with the scent of wildflowers and nature seem to be following its course, quite unmindful of the soldiers hiding behind rocks and camouflaged by mountain shrubbery. The birds sang as they always had and the flowers were in bloom. Bees buzzed about lazily.
Only when a shot rang out, the birds got startled and took flight, as if a musician had struck a jarring note on his instrument. It was almost the end of September, neither hot nor cold. It seemed as if summer and winter had made their peace. In the blue skies, cotton clouds floated all day like barges on a lake.
The soldiers seemed to be getting tired of this indecisive war where nothing much ever happened. Their positions were quite impregnable. The two hills on which they were placed faced each other and were about the same height, so no one side had an advantage. Down below in the valley, a stream zigzagged furiously on its stony bed like a snake.
The air force was not involved in the combat and neither of the adversaries had heavy guns or mortars. At night, they would light huge fires and hear each other's voices echoing through the hills.
From The Dog of Titwal, a short story. "
― Saadat Hasan Manto