Quotes from Chris Cleave

One could always imagine that one's life, though smoldering in parts, might be undamaged in the west.

That is the nature of this madness. It fills the sky with barrage balloons and people's eyes with hate.

trouble is like the ocean. It covers two thirds of the world.

cassava pots

The Americans were tall men on full rations and it clearly made no sense to them that exhaustion should have the last word in the common language of English. "How come?" Mary heard them yelling to each other, over the noise of the engines. "How come they just left it broken like this?

never be afraid of showing someone you love a working draft of yourself. David

From my country you have taken its future, and to my country you have sent the objects from your past. We do not have the seed, we have the husk.

Oh, thought Tom, so it finishes as quickly as this. All the things we make exceptional are merely borrowed from the mundane and must without warning be surrendered to it.

Two boots sank into the mud between Alistair and Duggan. The two men looked up. "OH, WELL ISN'T THIS DELIGHTFUL! THESE TWO LONDON GENTLEMEN HAVE COME TO THE COUNTRYSIDE FOR A PICNIC!

who, what, where, when, and why?

What he had not understood, before battle, was that time could become a ribbon to be looped and pinned back to its center, the petals of a black rosette. I

One time he showed me a picture of the band. It was the picture from the CD box. One of the musicians in the picture, he had a lot of hair. It was black with tight curls and it sat on the top of his head like a heavy weight and it went right down the back of his neck to his shoulders. I understand fashion in your language, but this hair did not look like fashion, I am telling you, it looked like a punishment.

My whole life is my work.

I think that there's something extremely beautiful about the Olympic ideal and its motto - 'Swifter, higher, stronger' - it's such a beautiful motto, and it celebrates everything which is the antithesis of death and dissolution and entropy.

We must see all scars as beauty. Okay? This will be our secret. Because take it from me, a scar does not form on the dying. A scar means, 'I survived'.

Sad words are just another beauty. A sad story means, this storyteller is alive

This thing with being lovers, it isn't like being married.