Nostalgia
Quotes - It’s not a crime to wish for other worlds
“How
can days and happenings and moments so good become so quickly ugly, and for no
reason, for no real reason? Just—change. With nothing causing it.”
―
Philip K. Dick, A Scanner Darkly
“Writing
from memory like this, I often feel a pang of dread. What if I've forgotten the
most important thing? What if somewhere inside me there is a dark limbo where
all the the truly important memories are heaped and slowly turning into mud?”
―
Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood
“...And
nostalgia is a cancer. Nostalgia will fill your heart up with tumors. Yeah,
yeah, yeah, that's what you are. You're just an old fart dying of terminal
nostalgia.”
―
Sherman Alexie, Ten Little Indians
“In
every age "the good old days" were a myth. No one ever thought they
were good at the time. For every age has consisted of crises that seemed
intolerable to the people who lived through them. ”
―
Brooks Atkinson
“No
matter how fierce was the passion that gripped him, the fact is he was
paralyzed, transfixed by the contemplation of his own past. Only something so
momentous as to drive from his consciousness all thoughts of before and after
could have propelled him forward. And with his eyes fixed on the past, he had
no choice but to continue along its trajectory.”
―
Natsume Sōseki, Kokoro
“It’s
not a crime to wish for other worlds. You’ll get taxed for it but they can’t
throw you in jail for creating your own private world…yet. Dramatics are fun,
an indulgence. ‘You can’t go backward,’ ‘You can’t live in the past,’ they tell
you. Why not? ‘You’ve got to put all that behind you and move on to other
things,’ they say. Bullshit! These are all expressions of modern disposability.
It’s a mediocritizing technique—trying to get rid of what I call ‘past
orthodoxies.’ It’s our past that makes us unique, therefore it’s our past that
economic interests want to rob from us, so they can sell us a new, improved future.
Society now depends on a disposable world—out with the old, in with the new,
including relationships. But how we weep and wish we could hold onto those
cherished moments forever, to those long-whispered dreams, those tortured
nights—how we want to grasp them and stop them from sifting through our
fingers. I say, ‘Don’t let it happen. Keep things the way you want them and let
the rest of the world be duped.”
―
Anton Szandor LaVey, The Secret Life of a Satanist: The Authorized Biography of
Anton LaVey
“for
those memories are now
just
like these little kittens
I
hold in my hands
those
can be kissed
and
treasured
but
not held too tightly.”
―
Sanober Khan, Turquoise Silence
“When
I was younger, I was told that there is too much inside me. That I have feelings
where others have bone. At the age of seven, a doctor tapped inside my head and
asked, "Do you choke on memories from time to time? Do you cry for no good
reason at all? Do words take a hammer to your head and crack your skull?"
Yes, yes, yes, I nodded. "Then you've definitely got them," he said,
as he checked off a box on his list. "Too many feelings. What a shame. Try
not to keep them inside or you'll drown.”
―
Lora Mathis
“Do
you know why they call me the Count? Because I love to count! Ah-hah-hah!
-
The Count Sesame Street”
―
Richard Bachman, The Long Walk
“Everyone
has two memories. The one you can tell and the one that is stuck to the
underside of that, the dark, tarry smear of what happened.”
―
Amy Bloom, Away
“You
boys must always remember your roots, everything that makes you Puerto Rican.
Don’t ever lose the stain of the plantain,” Isa said.”
―
Margarita Barresi, A Delicate Marriage
“Moments
never stay, whether or not you ask them, they do not care, no moment cares, and
the ones you wish could stretch out like a hammock for you to lie in, well,
those moments leave the quickest and take everything good with them, little
burglars, those moments, those hours, those days you loved the most.”
―
Catherine Lacey, Nobody Is Ever Missing
“How
quick and rushing life can sometimes seem, when at the same time it's so slow
and sweet and everlasting.”
―
Graham Swift, Tomorrow
“We
should have taken our chances back then, when we were young and beautiful and
didn't even know it.”
―
Lois McMaster Bujold, Diplomatic Immunity
“Let
us not hate or kill time, but embrace and escort it as a brother in arms,
without nostalgia or strain. If we follow the beat of our heart and channel the
timeliness of our expectations, we can detach ourselves from greed with its tempting
voices whispering "more and more" all the time. ("Swim or
sink")”
―
Erik Pevernagie
“I
love how summer just wraps it’s arms around you like a warm blanket.”
―
Kellie Elmore
“What
was our life like? I almost don't remember now. Though I remember it, the space
of time it occupied. And I remember it fondly.”
―
Richard Ford, The Sportswriter
“Have
you ever wondered how nostalgia isn"t what it used to be?”
―
Jasper Fforde, First Among Sequels
“There
are no days more full than those we go back to.”
―
Colum McCann, Zoli
“She
knew with suddeness and ease that this moment would be with her always, within
hand's reach of memory.
She
doubted if they all sensed it - they had seen the world - but even George was
silent for a minute as they looked, and the scene, the smell, even the sound of
the band playing a faintly recognisable movie theme, was locked forever in her,
and she was at peace.”
―
Stephen King, Carrie
“it's
good to have things done with
when
they don't work
it's
also good not to hate
or
even forget
the
person you've failed with.”
―
Charles Bukowski, Play the Piano Drunk Like a Percussion Instrument Until the
Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit
