Quotes About Transformation

Orlando had become a woman—there is no denying it. But in every other respect, Orlando remained precisely as he had been. The change of sex, though it altered their future, did nothing whatever to alter their identity.

I am the seasons, I think sometimes, January, May, November; the mud, the mist, the dawn. I cannot be tossed about, or float gently, or mix with other people. —Virginia Woolf, The Waves (Harvest Books, January 1, 1978) Originally published October 1931.

What ancient and obdurate oaks are uprooted in us by the act of sickness.

acolo, de-a curmeziÈ™ul golfului È™i printre dune, z?cea prietenia lui, p?strîndu-È™i întreaga vitalitate È™i realitate, asemenea cadavrului unui tîn?r care ar fi r?mas îngropat un secol în turb?, conservîndu-È™i roÈ™eaÈ›a proasp?t? a buzelor.

Én, kezemben a jegyzetfüzetemmel, kifejezéseket gyártva, csupán a változásokat jegyeztem; árnyék-magam csak az árnyakat figyelte szorgalmasan. Hogyan folytassam utamat, mondtam, én nélkül, súlytalanul, látomások nélkül egy súlytalan és illúziók nélkül való világban?

But often now this body she wore (she stopped to look at a Dutch picture), this body, with all its capacities, seemed nothing—nothing at all. She had the oddest sense of being herself invisible; unseen; unknown; there being no more marrying, no more having of children now, but only this astonishing and rather solemn progress with the rest of them, up Bond Street, this being Mrs. Dalloway; not even Clarissa any more; this being Mrs. Richard Dalloway.

So coming back from a journey, or after an illness, before habits had spun themselves across the surface, one felt that same unreality, which was so startling; felt something emerge. Life was most vivid then.

The fire that warms us can also consume us; it is not the fault of the fire.

Agnes Smedley also knows what the century knows: that we become what is done to us.

If we pursue a spiritual path in depth, then it changes who and what we are. There is no turning back. We can only move forward.

Most of the dandelions had changed from suns into moons.

The spiral is a spiritualized circle. In the spiral form, the circle, uncoiled, has ceased to be vicious; it has been set free.

I was a daisy fresh girl and look what you've done to me.

Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.

I shall continue to exist. I may assume other disguises, other forms, but I shall try to exist.

I knew—but I did know that I had crossed 700  The border. Everything I loved was lost But no aorta could report regret. A sun of rubber was convulsed and set; And blood-black nothingness began to spin A system of cells interlinked within Cells interlinked within cells interlinked Within one stem. And dreadfully distinct Against the dark, a tall white fountain played. I

When you laugh, I want to transform the entire world so it will mirror you.

I felt my life needed a shake-up.

This is, I believe, it: not the crude anguish of physical death but the incomparable pangs of the mysterious mental maneuver needed to pass from one state of being to another.

He stood up and took off the dressing gown, the skullcap, the slippers. He took off the linen trousers and shirt. He took off his head like a toupee, took off his collarbones like shoulder straps, took off his rib cage like a hauberk. He took off his hips and his legs, he took off his arms like gauntlets and threw them in a corner. What was left of him gradually dissolved, hardly coloring the air.

If his Russian was music, his English was murder.

Precautions to be taken in the case Of freak reincarnation: what to do On suddenly discovering that you Are now a young and vulnerable toad Plump in the middle of a busy road, Or a bear cub beneath a burning pine, Or a book mite in a revived divine.

I knew I had fallen in love with Lolita forever; but I also knew she would not be forever Lolita. She would be thirteen on January 1. In two years or so she would cease being a nymphet and would turn into a "young girl," and then, into a "college girl"—that horror of horrors.

Era Lo, sencillamente Lo, por la mañana, un metro cuarenta y ocho de estatura con pies descalzos. Era Lola con pantalones. Era Dolly en la escuela. Era Dolores cuando firmaba. Pero en mis brazos era siempre Lolita.