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46b690b
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Southly thru shrubby heath we tromped now till we got to wideway. Wideway I'd heard o' from storymen an' here it was, an open, long, flat o' roadstone. SAplin's'n'bush was musclin' up but wondersome'n'wild was that windy space.
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David Mitchell |
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37fa6ef
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It's cold and clammy in the alley like White Scar Cave in the Yorkshire Dales. Dad took me when I was ten. I find a dead cat lying on the ground at the first corner. It's gray like dust on the moon. I know it's dead because it's as still as a dropped bag, and because big flies are drinking from its eyes. How did it die? There's no bullet wound or fang marks, though its head's at a slumped angle so maybe it was strangled by a cat-strangler. ..
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David Mitchell |
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75299c7
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She'n'her bros at the school'ry'd made a new game, Zachry'n'Meronym on Mauna Kia, but Abbess say-soed 'em not to 'cos times are pretendin' can bend bein'. A whoah game it was, said Catkin, but I din't want to know its rules nor endin'.david
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David Mitchell |
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28d5486
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Sobering to think how one accursed night of baccarat can alter a man's social standing so irreversibly.
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David Mitchell |
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1c5501d
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A no-name place, as far as I could see, but it had a miserable cafe-cum-garage-cum-funeral parlor shared by a gang of silent locals and many flies who wheeled through the air like drugged angels of death.
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David Mitchell |
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15f1ce7
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Writing's a pathology," I say. "I'd pack it in tomorrow, if I could."
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David Mitchell |
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0693e63
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I pitched my voice for Dirty Harry, but it was more Lisping Baggins.
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David Mitchell |
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e7eebd9
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si nos convencemos de que la humanidad puede trascender colmillos y garras, si nos convencemos de que las diversas razas y credos pueden compartir pacificamente la tierra, (...)si nos convencemos de que los gobernantes deben ser justos, de que la violencia debe dominarse, de que el poder ha de ser responsable y las riquezas de la tierra y los oceanos deben repartirse equitativamente entre todos, este mundo se hara realidad. No me engano. Ya..
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spanish
utopia
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David Mitchell |
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53589ca
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A dragonfly arrives and leaves like a change of mind.
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David Mitchell |
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c80ccc2
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Clark Kent gives up his powers just to have sexual intercourse with Lois Lane in a glittery bed. Who'd make such a stupid swap? If you could fly? Deflect nuclear missiles into space? Turn back time by spinning the planet in reverse? Sexual intercourse can't be that good.
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David Mitchell |
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40ad7be
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To list and name people ... is to subjugate them.
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David Mitchell |
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e05a6dc
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An Anchorite was a girl who lived like a hermit in a cell, but in the wall of a church. A living human sacrifice, in a way.
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David Mitchell |
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2211777
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books may speak, but they do not listen.
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David Mitchell |
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54418d5
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Beauty is immune to definition.
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David Mitchell |
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8cd7d7d
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one's environment is a key to one's identity, but that environment, Papa Song's, was a key I had lost.
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David Mitchell |
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7e350e9
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the First Rule of Parenting states that you never wake a peacefully sleeping child.
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David Mitchell |
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83534a8
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Being born's a hell of a lottery
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lottery
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David Mitchell |
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3c8dd03
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A big fat zoo of snorers is snoring in all different rhythms
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David Mitchell |
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a389caf
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A dragonfly settles on a bulrush an inch from my nose. Its wings are like cellophane and Jonah says, "Its wings are like cellophane," and I say, "I was just thinking that," but Jonah says, "Just thinking what?" so maybe I just thought he'd said it. Valium rubs out speech marks and pops thought-bubbles. I've noticed it before."
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David Mitchell |
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c6e3f41
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love's not just the drug; it's also the dealer.
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David Mitchell |
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0894bb4
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Places change you, Miss Timms, and deserts change us pale northerners so much, our own mothers wouldn't recognize us.
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David Mitchell |
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834a157
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Are we mutants? Have we evolved this way? Or are we designed? Designed by whom? Why did the designer go to such elaborate lengths, only to vacate the stage and leave us wondering why we exist? For entertainment? For perversity? For a joke? To judge us? "To what end?"
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David Mitchell |
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1c44d1e
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if an atrocity isn't written about, it stops existing when the last witnesses die. That's what I can't stand. If a mass shooting, a bomb, a whatever, is written about, then at least it's made a tiny dent in the world's memory. Someone, somewhere, some time, has a chance of learning what happened. And, just maybe, acting on it. Or not. But at least it's there.
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David Mitchell |
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89b560d
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But love's not just the drug; it's also the dealer. Love wants love in return, am I right, Olly? Like drugs, the highs look divine, and I envy the users. But when the side effects kick in--jealousy, the rages, grief, I think, Count me out. Elizabethans equated romantic love with insanity. Buddhists view it as a brat throwing a tantrum at the picnic of the calm mind.
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David Mitchell |
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576e4e9
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It's not a girl's glittering personality that men're interested in, Holly. It never bloody is.
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David Mitchell |
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ad878dc
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Thunder splits the rift where the Sun floods in.
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David Mitchell |
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ca71361
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Modesty is Vanity's craftier stepbrother.
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David Mitchell |
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dba6d7c
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Olly's glowing; if he was six inches tall and fluffy, Toys R Us would ship him by the thousands.
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glowing
toys-r-us
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David Mitchell |
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b9ad7a7
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Your power stations, your cars, your creature comforts. Well, you lived too long. The bill's due. Today.
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end-of-the-world
environmentalism
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David Mitchell |
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af5e658
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Every Adam needs an Eve.
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eve
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David Mitchell |
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45f40dd
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Never too late. Shooting is prayer. And when civilisation shuts up shop, a gun'll be worth any number of university degrees.
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gun
shop
university-degree
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David Mitchell |
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1554337
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That is more or less it. Middle age is flown, but it is attitude, not years, that condemns one to the ranks of the Undead, or else proffers salvation. In the domain of the young there dwells many an Undead soul. They rush about so, their inner putrefaction is concealed for a few decades, that is all.
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David Mitchell |
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6092810
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Don't you ever have days when you're just so glad to be alive you want to" - he turns to me - "howl at the sun?"
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David Mitchell |
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8d01b76
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Holly steps back. Being warned about a ghost and seeing him are not the same. 'What did they
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death
immortality
life
metaphor
mortality
speech
time
title
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David Mitchell |
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ffa2745
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Cynicism can blind one to subtler virtues
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David Mitchell |
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22772ba
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Young mothers are the most vicious tribe in the world if you don't fit in.
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David Mitchell |
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2f4961d
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The most humiliating thing you can do to a man is to save his life.
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David Mitchell |
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749aa59
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Why's it okay to draw spaceships if you're seven, but not okay to draw diabolical mazes?
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spaceships
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David Mitchell |
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01bcc40
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And grade every simile and metaphor from one star to five, and remove any threes or below. It hurts when you operate, but afterwards you feel much better.
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writing
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David Mitchell |
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d08bea7
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Girls fascinate in different ways. Try 'em one day. Tapped on the pane, and asked in French if she'd save my life by falling in love with me.
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David Mitchell |
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651da69
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My heart's a clubbed baby seal.
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David Mitchell |
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912733d
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Most cities are nouns, but New York is a verb. What might Beunas Yerbas be, I wonder?' 'A string of adjectives and conjunctions?' 'Or an expletive?
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David Mitchell |
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bef7b0a
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Coupling is frenzy; decoupling is farce.
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decoupling
frenzy-farce
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David Mitchell |
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f4e313a
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People talk about the Endarkenment like our ancestors talked about the Black Death, as if it's an act of God. But we summoned it, with every tank of oil we burned our way through. My generation were diners stuffing ourselves senseless at the Restaurant of the Earth's Riches knowing--while denying--that we'd be doing a runner and leaving our grandchildren a tab that can never be paid.
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David Mitchell |