Night Film QUOTES

161 " You see, that priest—he was still there, hanging on, silently waiting at the perimeter. An oily shadow always around. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

162 " But now that you mention it, will you promise to off me when I'm ninety and never leave home without an oxygen tank? Make a day of it. Just roll me and my wheelchair off the George Washington Bridge and call it a life. Deal?"
The request seemed to make her smile. "Deal."
"They should really tack that on to the marriage ceremony. 'Do you promise to love, honor, obey me, and also to kill me when I can no longer stand in a shower?'? "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

163 " There were two things that Beckman truly loathed in life: sitting in the first three rows of the movie theater and the Catholic Church. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

164 " I was aware of how shoddily stitched together the words were—suddenly I was a kid in the hall standing outside my locker about to head to Math. But that was how it went sometimes, the English language, when you really needed it, crumbled to clay in your mouth. That’s when all the real things were said. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

165 " What in the hell was happening to me? How flimsy sanity was. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

166 " I’d barely worn it out. Life had been a suit I’d only put on for special occasions. Most of the time I kept it in the back of my closet, forgetting it was there. We were meant to die when it was barely stitched anymore, when the elbows and knees were stained with grass and mud, shoulder pads uneven from people hugging you all the time, downpours and blistering sun, the fabric faded, buttons gone. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

167 " Is she sad? she asked.
No, honey. She's lived-in. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

168 " The church’s entrance was strewn with the dark immobile forms of men in bulky overcoats, asleep on cardboard boxes. They might have been dark whales, caught unaware by a tide that suddenly receded, leaving them stranded on the steps. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

169 " He also had a gung-ho hairline. It couldn’t wait to get started, "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

170 " He seemed about to ask me something else, but instead turned, strolling across the parking lot, pulling out his cigarettes.
It was after four o’clock. The sun had loosened its grip on the world, letting the shadows get sloppy, the light, thawed and soft. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

171 " On the table in front of her was a plate of half-finished French toast, floating like a houseboat on the Mississippi in a pool of syrup. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

172 " The drive to Livingston Manor was an hour and a half of snaking backcountry roads. It was already getting dark, the sky fading to a bruised blue. There were no street signs along Benton Hollow Road, no house numbers, no streetlights, not even any lines — just my car’s faded headlights, which didn’t so much push back the advancing dark as nervously rummage through it. To our left was a wall of solid shrubbery, barbed and impenetrable; to our right, vast black land stretched out, rumpled pastures and faded farmhouses, a lone porch light punctuating the night. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

173 " I think I've heard this story before. He died alone?"
"Everyone dies alone. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

174 " I will show you fear in a handful of dust, "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

175 " The girl was about as stealthy as a semi hauling a wide load. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

176 " Mortal fear is as crucial a thing to our lives as love. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

177 " I could hear his breathing, every breath he borrowed from the world then set free. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

178 " That was the magnificent thing about the city: It was inherently Machiavellian. One rarely had to worry about follow-throughs, follow-ups, follow the leaders, or any kind of consistency in people due to no machinations of one's own but the sheer force of living here. New York hit its residents daily like a great debilitating deluge and only the strongest-the ones with Spartacus-styled will- had the strength to stay not just afloat but on course. This pertained to work as much as it did to personal lives. Most people ended up, after only a couple of months, far, far away from where they'd intended to go, stuck in some barbed underbrush of a quagmire when they'd meant to head straight to the ocean. Others outright drowned (became drug addicts) or climbed ashore (moved to Connecticut). "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

179 " - На тот маловероятный случай, если ты на самом деле оказался в этом феноменальном, весьма завидном положении и правда умудрился провалиться в историю Кордовы, я должен напоследок дать тебе совет.
Я молча ждал.
- Будь хорошим парнем, - сказал он.
- Как я узнаю, что я хороший парень?
Он ткнул меня пальцем и кивнул:
- Очень мудрый вопрос. Ты не знаешь. Большинство плохих парней считают, что они хорошие. Но есть кое-какие означающие. Ты несчастен. Тебя ненавидят. Ты толком не постигаешь подлинной природы вещей до самой последней минуты - да и тогда лишь в том случае, если тебе хватит упорства и безумия пойти до самого что ни есть конца. Но главное - это критично, - ты действуешь, не думая о себе. То, что тобою движет, вообще не имеет касательства к твоему эго. Ты действуешь во имя справедливости. Или милосердия. Или любви. Это большие, весьма героические качества, и тащить их на своих плечах под силу только хорошим. И ещё ты умеешь слушать и выслушать.
Он снова облизнулся и нахмурил брови:
- Если ты хороший парень, ты сможешь выжить, Макгрэт. Но, разумеется, с Кордовой нет никаких гарантий. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film

180 " Every paradise has its viper. "

― Marisha Pessl , Night Film