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1 " If you show someone something you've written, you give them a sharpened stake, lie down in your coffin, and say, ‘When you’re ready’. "
― David Mitchell , Black Swan Green
2 " There no such thing as something! Why? Because everything's already turning into something else! "
3 " Trees're always a relief, after people. "
4 " Disco's are tricky. You look a total wally if you dance too early but after one crucial song tips the disco over, you look a sad saddo if you don't. "
5 " But you have read Madame Bovary?' (I'd never heard of her books.) 'No. "
6 " The art teacher's scarlet book was called Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille. 'As the title suggests,' Mr Dunwoody saw the book'd caught my attention, 'it's about the history of opticians. What are you about? "
7 " Words are what you fight with but what you fight about is whether or not you’re afraid of them. "
8 " ...it’s not just the person who fills a house, it’s their I’ll be back later!s, their toothbrushes and unused hats and coats, their belongingnesses. "
9 " Photos’re better than nothing, but things’re better than photos ’cause the things themselves were part of what was there. "
10 " Perfume counters in department stores, Holly Deblin smells of, the middle of July, and cinnamon Tic Tacs. "
11 " Poems are lenses, mirrors, and X-ray machines. "
12 " Secrets affect you more than you’d think. You lie to keep them hidden. You steer talk away from them. You worry someone’ll discover yours and tell the world. You think you are in charge of the secret, but isn’t it the secret who’s actually using you? "
13 " Fire’s the sun, unwindin’ itself out o’ the wood. "
14 " Will I be some kid’s dad one day? Are any future people lurking deep inside mine?...Which girl’s carrying the other half of my kid, deep in those intricate loops? What’s she doing right now? What’s her name? "
15 " I’d always worried but kissing’s not so tricky. Your lips know what to do, just like sea anenomes know what to do. Kissing spins you, like Flying Tea-Cups. Oxygen the girl breathes out, you breathe in. "
16 " Green is made of yellow and blue, nothing else, but when you look at green, where’ve the yellow and the blue gone? Somehow this is to do with Moran’s dad. Somehow this is to do with everyone and everything. "
17 " The song instantly insisted it'd never existed. "
18 " Eavesdropping’s sort of thrilling ’cause you learn what people really think, but eavesdropping makes you miserable for exactly the same reason. "
19 " Revolting’ was the last word I ever spoke as someone who’d never kissed a girl. "
20 " Our right to be here is weaker by the minute "
