{"author":"Mervyn Peake","author_id":"Mervyn+Peake","total_quotes":42,"quotes":[{"text":"The emotional, loving, moody child had small chance of developing into a happy woman. Had she as a girl been naturally joyus yet all that had befallen her must surely have driven away the bright birds, one by one, from her breast. As it was, made of more sombre clay, capable of deep happiness, but more easily drawn to the dark than the light, Fuchsia was even more open to the cruel winds of circumstance which appeared to have singled her out for particular punishment.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["circumstance","coping","depression","happiness","personality"],"id":15512,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"She had expressed herself, as women will, in a smug broadside of pastel shades. Nothing clashed because nothing had the strength to clash; everything murmured of safety among the hues; all was refinement.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["clash","colors","pastels","safety","women"],"id":23814,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"Meanwhile Bellgrove had been savouring love's rare aperitif, the ageless language of the eyes.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["eyes","love"],"id":40694,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"But his mind saw nothing of all this. His mind was engaged in a warfare of the gods. His mind paced outwards over no-man's-land, over the fields of the slain, paced to the rhythm of the blood's red bugles. To be alone and evil! To be a god at bay. What was more absolute?","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["evil","god","rage"],"id":43790,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"I am too rich already, for my eyes mint.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["beauty","beauty-in-nature","eyes","gold","riches","wealth"],"id":56504,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"It was not often that Flay approved of happiness in others. He saw in happiness the seeds of independence, and in independence the seeds of revolt. But on an occasion such as this it was different, for the spirit of convention was being rigorously adhered to, and in between his ribs Mr. Flay experienced twinges of pleasure.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["happiness","independence","revolution"],"id":68785,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"Oh how I hate people!","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["people"],"id":97240,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"How's the blood-stream, my dear, invaluable little woman? How's the blood-stream?'...'It's quite comfortable, sir...I think, sir, thank yo.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["doctor","humorous","nannie"],"id":122210,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"I want a big breakfast,' said Fuchsia at last. 'I want a lot to eat, I'm going to think today.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["eating","thinking"],"id":150172,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"},{"text":"To say that the frozen silence contracted itself into a yet higher globe of ice were to under-rate the exquisite tension and to shroud it in words. The atmosphere had become a physical sensation. As when, before a masterpiece, the acid throat contracts, and words are millstones, so when the supernaturally outlandish happens and a masterpiece is launched through the medium of human gesture, then all human volition is withered at the source and the heart of action stops beating. Such a moment was this. Irma, a stalagmite of crimson stone, knew, for all the riot of her veins that a page had turned over. At chapter forty? O no! At chapter one, for she had never lived before save in a pulseless preface. How long did they remain thus? How many times had the earth moved round the sun? How many times had the great blue whales of the northern waters risen to spurt their fountains at the sky? How many reed-bucks had fallen to the claws of how many leopards, while that sublime unit of two-figure statuary remained motionless? It is fruitless to ask. The clocks of the world stood still or should have done.","author":"Mervyn Peake","tags":["falling-in-love","love","lovers","middle-age","passing-of-time"],"id":158906,"author_id":"Mervyn+Peake"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":42,"pages":5,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}