The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August QUOTES

61 " I am writing this for you.
My enemy.
My friend.
You know, already, you must know.
You have lost. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

62 " As if a second Einstein will one day sit up in his bed and exclaim, ‘Mein Gott! Ich habe es gesehen!’ and that’s it, the universe comprehended. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

63 " The most it ever seems we know how to do with time is to waste it. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

64 " It was a reminder of the old truth that for tyranny to flourish all it required was the complicity of good men. In China at that time how many millions of good men, I wondered, were silently watching while this louder, snappier minority of believers marched and sang their way towards famine and destruction? "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

65 " You’re not from around here–you CIA?” he demanded. “I’m not CIA,” I replied wearily. “Just here to see the Buddhas.” “What Buddhas?” “The Buddhas of Bamiyan?” I suggested, doing my best not to let my contempt of this bandit’s ignorance show. “Carved into the mountainside itself ?” “Hell yeah,” mused the man on the truck. “I’ve seen them. You’re right to go now–twenty years from now they won’t even be standing!” I stepped back, surprised, and had another look at this ragged, smelling, dust-covered man. He grinned, touched his hand to his forelock and said, “Well, nice to meet you, even if you aren’t CIA.” He hopped down from the truck and began to head away. I called out, surprised at myself for even doing it, “Tiananmen Square.” He stopped, then swung round on the spot, toe pointing up and ankle digging into the dirt as he did, like a dancer. Still grinning his easy grin, he swaggered back towards me, stopping so close I could feel the stickiness coming off his body. “Hell,” he said at last. “You don’t look much like a Chinese spy neither.” “You don’t look like an Afghan warlord,” I pointed out. “Well, that’s because I’m only passing through this place on the way to somewhere else.” “Anywhere in particular?” “Wherever there’s action. We’re men of war, see–that’s what we do and we do it well–and there’s no shame in that because it’ll happen without us anyway, but with us–” his grin widened “–maybe it’ll happen that little bit faster. But what’s a nice old gentleman like you doing talking about Chinese geography, hey?” “Nothing,” I replied with a shrug. “The word just popped into my head. Like Chernobyl–just words.” Fidel’s eyebrows flickered, though his grin remained fixed. Then he gave a great chuckle, slapped me so hard on the shoulder that I nearly lost my footing, stepped back a little to admire his handiwork, and finally roared out loud. “Jesus, Joseph and the Holy Mary,” he blurted. “Michael fucking Jackson to you too. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

66 " We will not be gods, you or I.
We will not look into that mirror.
Instead, for those few days you have left, you are mortal at last. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

67 " So, having known what euphoria is, it remains precisely that–a word with longing attached, but no meaning when actually experiencing the thing. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

68 " for tyranny to flourish all it required was the complicity of good men. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

69 " In a way, the nausea was worse than the pain. Pain can be drowned, but nausea eats through even the most delicious opiates and cutting chemicals. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

70 " We’d been told that the village was already liberated, that there would be no resistance, but there it was, sat between the bakery and the church like a horsefly on a slice of melon. We’d been so relaxed we didn’t even notice it until the barrel swung round towards us like the eye of a muddy crocodile and its jaws released the shell that killed two of us outright and young Tommy Kenah three days later in his hospital bed. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

71 " Speaking Mandarin with a Russian accent is extremely difficult. Of all the languages I have learned, Mandarin took me the longest, and having to replicate the suitable tones while simultaneously presenting myself as a rather bumbling Soviet scholar was an exercise that caused me considerable distress. In "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

72 " What is the point of you?
The world is ending.
Now it's up to you. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

73 " That’s a really nice thought–” I sighed “–and I’m grateful for it, but there comes a point when one realises that gratification of the flesh is only so fulfilling. It’s fantastic while it lasts, but comes with so many questions of emotional baggage and doubt that frankly I begin to question whether the grief involved outweighs the satisfaction gained. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

74 " Who are you, god that you would become, to destroy the world in your search for knowledge? "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

75 " …and so, ladies and gentlemen, I give you, the bride to be.” I applauded because everyone else did, on automatic, and looked up to behold the linear mortal who Vincent had decided to occupy himself with this time. Would she be a Frances, chosen to make an unseen Hugh jealous while playing tennis on the lawn? Or Leticia, perhaps, pretty but vacant; perhaps a Mei, adding that air of respectability as he went about his nefarious deeds, or a Lizzy, a companion in dark hours, a figure who was nine parts being there to only one part chemistry. She stepped to the front of the room, a woman with a hint of grey streaking the edge of her hair, dressed in a mermaid dress the colour of clotted cream, and she was Jenny. My Jenny. Memory, moving too fast to process. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

76 " My loss of faith was not revelatory, nor intensely distressing. It was a prolonged growth of resignation, one which the events of my life had only reinforced, until I was forced to conclude that any conversations I had with a deity were entirely one way. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

77 " His office was an attempt at wood-panelled antiquity that the building could not sustain. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

78 " the best way to talk to God is by yourself. "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

79 " My dad was blown up by a tank in Poland, but he left us the car. You want a ride? "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August

80 " Were we, all of us, so used to apathy and deceit that not one had bothered to raise the question of it? Did we all take betrayal so much for granted? "

― Claire North , The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August