Quotes About Tragedy

I'd been upstaged, demoted from protagonist in my own drama to comic relief in my parents' tragedy

Harris Blanchard was a terrible human being. But he was also a kid like Emily was, with a mother and a father. And his death hasn't changed my life for the better. It hasn't made Emily any more alive.

At the time, she'd been pregnant with her first child, a girl, which made her sympathize with me instead of the rich golden-haired boy with the angelic blue eyes and the premed major. I couldn't imagine anything worse, she had told me in the squad car, than losing a daughter like that.

Mount Shady is a lovely town, but it's also homogenous and boring, and boredom dulls your ability to make the right decisions. Boredom creeps up on you slowly, wraps its tendrils around you and tugs at you in such a subtle yet constant way, you'll do anything to escape it. You'll behave recklessly and stupidly. You'll trust the wrong people, with disastrous results. Emily would still be alive if we'd stayed in New York.

The world should have stopped, but it didn't. The world kept on going. How can the world just keep on going? An earthquake in India kills a thousand people, and the world keeps on going. A famine in China kills a million people, and the world keeps on going. The twin towers of the World Trade Center buckle and fall, and the world, the world keeps on going.

I suppose, too, that the moment when a man hears that a girl's fiance has died only that day is the last moment that that man should ever begin to fall in love with her, but I'm afraid that's just how it was. The emotions are no respecters of the niceties, the proprieties and decencies of this life...

In all, the crew of the St Laurent picked up and took to safety over eight hundred survivors, an astonishing feat almost without parallel in the lifesaving annals of the sea, almost enough to make one forget, if even only for a moment, the barbed wire and the thousand men who died. Almost, but not quite.

more than 50 per cent of Amstetten's menfolk who had marched off to fight for Hitler did not make it back home.

They were blown off my feet when the South Tower collapsed

Any attempts at humor immediately after September 11th were deemed tasteless.

You never know how you're going to react to something. To anything. Tragedy, joy, heartache. They affect us all in different ways in different times and different places.

Maybe Justin, my students, spoiled me for people my own age, usually so boring, talking about their endless health problems, pros/cons of being cremated, not realizing they're already dead in the most tragic way.

Siempre queda una tristeza nueva por conocer, y un trapo roto y sucio para torearla.

Y después el final, el instante en el que había acabado todo, carguen, apunten, fuego, y trece cuerpos desplomándose a la vez en la tierra del cementerio del Este, veintiséis ojos cerrados para siempre, veintiséis brazos y piernas inmóviles, trece gargantas mudas y todavía calientes en la temperatura de sus últimos gritos, vivas a la República que volvía a morir cada mañana en las voces de sus hijos

the drowned Enid Stibbins, Ernest's first wife

Toda nostalgia es nipona. No hay nada más japonés que languidecer sobre el propio pasado y sobre su anticuada majestad y vivir la fluidez del tiempo como una trágica y grandiosa derrota. Un senegalés que echa de menos el Senegal de antaño es un nipón que no sabe lo que es. Una chiquilla belga llorando a causa del recuerdo del país del Sol Naciente merece la nacionalidad Japonesa por partida doble.

La tragedia consiste nel rivedere la persona e non riconoscerla, o perché in quel momento si scopre in lei un aspetto incredibilmente spiacevole che doveva gia esser presente ma sul quale si era riusciti a illudersi in nome di quella strana forma d'amore così misteriosa e così pericolosa, la cui posta in gioco sfugge continuamente: l'amicizia.

The action we take and the decisions we make in this decade will have consequences far into this century. If America shows weakness and uncertainty, the world will drift toward tragedy. That will not happen on my watch.

I believe the most solemn duty of the American president is to protect the American people. If America shows uncertainty and weakness in this decade, the world will drift toward tragedy. This will not happen on my watch.

The Iraqi people are living a long-running tragedy because of the legacy of the old regime, the Americans and their actions that are unsuitable for Iraqi society, and the weakness of national resolve.

Humor is not a sign of weakness. In fact, humor can be your greatest asset in the face of tragedy.

The tragedy of Eliot Spitzer is almost Greek: Ascendant son of wealth and privilege dedicates his life to social justice, warns of the corruption lurking among us, and falls victim to his inner demons at the very moment of vindication.

Things happen to everybody in the course of a lifetime. Relationships end, people die, tragedy befalls everyone. So everyone has this wealth of experience, and the older you are the more you have to draw on.

Why is the public so interested in movies about the wealthy? My answer is that Shakespeare wrote about kings. That's where the action is. And it's the classic, cathartic thing. You get to indulge in a lifestyle you're not part of, a tragic error leads to a downfall, and you get to say, 'Thank God I'm not him.'