But there are times of suffering which remain in our lives like black absolutes and are not blotted out. Fortunate are those for whom these black stars shed some sort of light.
There is a pointlessness of summer London more awful than anything which fogs or early afternoon twilights are able to evoke, a summer mood of yawning and glazing eyes and little nightmare-ridden sleeps in bored and desperate rooms. With this ennui, evil comes creeping through the city, the evil of indifference and sleepiness and lack of care. At such a time the long-fought temptation is wearily yielded to, and the long-dreamt-of crime is with shoulder-shrugging casualness committed at last.
He had for many years now been spared the demons, though he was constantly aware of their continued presence. He could hear them, as it were, moving behind the wall. They belonged to him and would doubtless go with him to the grave. His mind too, like David’s, ran irresistibly to the horror.
I wanted consolation, I wanted love, I wanted, to save me, some colossal and powerful love such as I had never known before.
The wound with which she travelled vibrated within her. She thought, I shall never have what I desire. I shall become bitter and defeated and dim, and I shall never really paint, I am a freak, a crippled animal, something to be put down, put to sleep, put out of its misery.
When one is very close to Truth itself, truthfulness vanishes.
Now let us leave this place, it is rather eerie.
How fearful that dark shadow is when we catch sight of it in the life of another. No wonder those at whom that black arrow is aimed so often turn and flee. How unendurable it can be, the love another bears us. I would never persecute my darling with that dread knowledge. From now onward until the world ended everything must remain, although utterly changed, exactly as it was before.
I must tell her, but later, later, later, when it’s all long finished and no longer an agony.
Understanding was out of the question; and indeed how passionately, just then, I did not want to be understood.
Ducane knew that Willy had looked forward to this visit. He knew too that the visit was rendering Willy unspeakably miserable.
You know when things get inside you and you can’t stop going round and round the same piece of misery.
We must keep this love uncontaminated even if we kill it.
I’ve not often been happy or thought it was in my stars.
There had been a slaughter of all my other interests, and upon the strange white open scene of the future only one thing remained.
I saw through a black veil of misery and remorse and indecision and fear; and there was a feeling as if I carried a small leaden coffin in the place of my heart.
You understand nothing of – the horror – no wonder you can’t write real books – you don’t see – the horror –.
How had this weird idea been conceived, how had it grown until it seemed inevitable?
Of course she had read this work many times before, but there were certain parts to which she passionately returned: so cool, so elegant, so beautiful, so terrible. As she read tears began to stream down her face.
How could two such different worlds co-exist, how could they communicate?