Quotes from David Ebershoff

I know someone loves me from how they say my name. Like with my mom and dad, when they say "Benjamin" it's like my name is safe in their mouth.

I trust you have seen the ocean. If you have, then you have witnessed the divine. How barren the ground is in comparison! If I could count the hours I have spent staring out at it! And yet those hours never feel lost. I cannot imagine how else I could refill them were I given a second chance.

And wasn't that the inexhaustible struggle for Greta? Her perpetual need to be alone but always loved, and in love.

Faith, I tell them, is a mystery, elusive to many, and never easy to explain.

Isn't it interesting what a stranger can offer? A little wisdom, a little mercy, a little love.

I suppose my greatest disappointment has been realizing my father, like Joseph and Brigham before him, tried to shroud his passions in the mantle of religion. He used God to defend his adultery. --- Ann Eliza Young, page 253

Do you know what I miss most about Rosemary? Simply knowing she was there.

There is nothing more alarming to a boy than seeing a mother, or a father, buckling. It says to him that all will not be well. The boy does not know this, but he senses it, as a dog senses it, as a dog sense his master's true state of mind. (Lorenzo Dee)

Yes, but if I were to look down there what would I see?" "Don't think about it like that," Greta said. "That's not the only thing that makes you Lili.

Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe.

Even though she was sitting next to the man, she couldn't believe he had noticed her. It felt to her as if no one could see her. She hardly felt real.

I, of course, cherish my freedom, but I shall never want my freedom to restrict the freedom of another. In that case then I am not truly free, and none of us is truly free.

Lili could remember that, the feeling of biting down on one's thoughts and feelings and storing them up for no one.

Anna's voice wasn't a beautiful voice - rough edged and sorrowful, a bit used, somehow male and female at once. Yet it had more vibrancy to it than most Danish voices, which were often thin and white and too pretty to trigger a shiver. Anna's voice had the heat of the south; it warmed Einar, as if her throat were red with coals.

What do I consider myself now? A man attempting to be good. In this endeavor I have no use for church and steeple. If another man does, I only wish he finds what he needs.

Isn't a gay Mormon like an oxymoron?' 'Do I look like an oxymoron to you?' 'An oxymormon.

You will loose everything" "I already have.

Anywhere the devout gather to worship, there will always be a parade.

Sometimes when you're driving down a back road in Utah, you think if there is a God, then he probably had something to do with all of this. It's just that fucking beautiful.

Nació en un páramo. Era un niñita nacida envuelta en un cuerpo de niño en un páramo

Lili chiuse gli occhi (li sentiva così pesanti sotto lo strato di cipria!) e pensò a Copenhagen come a una città dove lei e Einar potevano vivere entrambi come una stessa persona.

I wish I could claim I faced my first day of apostasy with courage and certainty. Yet in truth, I had never felt more afraid.

There was a terrible stretch of time in Einar's life - from the time Hans left Bluetooth until the day he met Greta at the academy - when he lived without anyone to reveal his secrets to. Lili could remember that, the feeling of biting down on one's thoughts and feelings and storing them up for no one.

Don't believe everything you read.