Quotes from Paullina Simons

I will make you insane, her memory screamed at her near the winter window sill as Tatiana smelled the brine of eternity. On the outside you will walk and smile as if indeed you are a normal woman, but on the inside you will twist and burn on the stake, I will never free you, you will never be free.

They came with their children, for no one left the children behind - it was for the children they had come, wanting to give them the halls of American, the streets, the seasons, the New York of America.

It wasn't first love. It wasn't a first kiss. But it was love nonetheless. And the kiss was sweet. And the heart still pounded. And the girl went on.

I could have lived through it all if only I continued to have the feeling that at the end of childhood, at the end of adolescence, there was something else in this life that would be mine, that I could make with my bare hands, and once I had made it, I could say, I did this to my life. I made my life so.

Father continues to make the vulgar error," she said, "that to a woman, love is her whole existence.

Shura, I'm going to die.

I can't brethe." She was embracing him the way he used to embrace her in Lazarevo. And for the same reason. "Open your mouth," she whispered, leaning onto his face. "I'll breath for you.

When you're unsure of yourself, whenever you're in doubt, ask yourself three questions. What do you believe in? What do you hope for? But most important, ask yourself, what do you love? And when you answer, Tatiana, you will know who you are. And more important - if you ask this question of the people around you, you will know who they are too.

When he asked isn't it beautiful, my father was seeing his youth, and his youth was beautiful. He closed his eyes and saw himself young and so handsome, in love with many girls, funny, brilliant, popular. Of course it was beautiful. It was mystifying. It was mystical.

E non me lo hai nascosto. Niente affatto. Hai lasciato il tuo amore in bella mostra, non lo hai chiuso in un armadio. Marina aveva ragione. Ero cieca. Lo hai lasciato in mille posti perché io lo vedessi. Adesso li vedo tutti e mi fanno male. Ma tu eri una bambina. Come poteva una bambina amare qualcuno?

Tatia, let me take care of you." He stopped and took a breath.

Sometimes the beast needs to be loved before it can be lovable. Love her in her sin, that's what divine love means. Love her with the highest form of love on earth. Love everything. Then you will see mystery in everything.

Slightly less time than it takes one woman to make one life, they managed to snuff out a million and a half lives.

Me estuviste buscando?», le había preguntado Tatiana una vez, y él había contestado: «Toda la vida».

What does it mean to be human, to be good, to be moral, to be all three at once? It means that flawed beings often must choose between two flawed options.

Te volveré loca —gritó su memoria cuando Tatiana se sentó a respirar la brisa salada de la eternidad en el alféizar de la ventana—. Andarás sonriente por la calle como una mujer normal, pero en tu interior te retorcerás como en la hoguera. No te liberaré, nunca serás libre.»

No vas a morir, soldado —responde Tatiana—. Sigue viviendo, sigue respirando, aférrate a la vida, no te dejes ir. Prométeme que vivirás por mí, y yo te prometo que cuando termines, te estaré esperando. —Ha empezado a sollozar—. Donde quiera que termines, Alexander, me encontrarás a mí esperándote

Breathing in Shepelevo was like hitting the right note on the piano. There was only one note. When I was young, Shepelevo was the smell of nettles, of salted smoked fish, of fresh water from the Gulf of Finland, and of burning firewood, all wrapped up in one Shepelevo.

I walked into my dream and kept walking with my Leningrad in front of me and behind me and all around me. I wasn't carrying Russia with me. It was carrying me.

That's what it was. I had been given something I absolutely did not deserve. And only here in coming back did I realize what I had been freely given. Why was I given it? What was I going to do with it now that I knew I had it? I didn't want to go to sleep. I didn't want this to be my last night. I didn't want to go home. I wanted to understand, and after I understood, to feel better.

there is one place I'm comforted. I wake up there, and I go to sleep there; I am at peace there, and loved there: your subsuming arms. Tatiana

They kissed as if in a fever…they kissed as if the breath were leaving their bodies.

All Alexander hears is his mother pleading, screaming, crying into the closed face of the consulate guard, as he keeps trying to pull her away, Please please please help him, we have money, a place to live, help him, help him, help him—

A good man has as much chance of dying as a bad one. Maybe more so.