Sadness

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 104 of 212 · 20 per page

• From On Beauty (2005)

  People these days think they can outrun death. It’s just time.’  On Beauty Harry just wanted Howard to sit down, start again. There were four more hours of quality viewing lined up before bedtime – antique shows and property shows and travel shows and game shows – all of which he and his son might watch together in silent companionship, occasionally commenting on this presenter’s overbite, another’s small hands or sexual preference. And this would all be another way of saying: It’s good to see you. It’s been too long. We’re family . But Howard couldn’t do this when he was sixteen and he couldn’t do it now. He just did not believe, as his father did, that time is how you spend your love. And so, to avoid a conversation about an Australian soap actress, Howard moved into the kitchen to wash up his cup and a few other things in the sink. Ten minutes later he left.  The Victorians were terrific cemetery designers. In London we used to have seven, ‘The Magnificent Seven’: Kensal Green (), Norwood (), Highgate (), Abney Park (), Brompton (), Nunhead () and Tower Hamlets (). Rangy pleasure gardens in the daytime, necropolises by night, they crawled with ivy and sprung daffodils from their rich mulch. Some have been built over; others are in an appalling state of disrepair. Kensal Green survives. Seventy-seven acres, two hundred and fifty thousand souls. Space for Anglican Dissenters, Muslims, the Russian Orthodox, one famous Zoroastrian and, next door in St Mary’s, the Catholics. Here are angels without their heads, Celtic crosses missing their extremities, a few sphinxes toppled over into the mud. It is what La Cimetière du Père Lachaise would look like if nobody knew it was there or went to visit it. In the s Kensal Green was a peaceful spot, north-west of the city, where the great and the good might find their final rest. Now, on all sides, this ‘country’ cemetery greets the city: flats on one side, offices on the other, the railway trains vibrate the flowers in their cheap plastic pots, and the chapel  on beauty and being wrong cowers under the gas holder, a mammoth drum stripped of its skin. Behind a line of yew trees in the northern part of this cemetery, Carlene Kipps was buried. Walking away from the grave, the Belseys kept a distance from the rest of the party. They felt themselves to be in a strange social limbo. They knew no one except the family, and yet they were not close to the family.

• From The Annotated Lolita (1991)

  78), alluding to The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902). He is wrong, but his suspicion summarizes the way that Nabokov frequently parodies and transmutes the methods and themes of that genre, just as “Shirley Holmes” is a jocular reminder that Lolita is, among other things, a kind of mystery story demanding a considerable amount of armchair detection. See the remarks on Poe and the detective story, Lo-lee-ta. For the penultimate moment in this “tale of ratiocination,” see Waterproof; and for a telling allusion to Holmes, drawn from The Defense, see everything fell into order ... the pattern of branches ... the satisfaction of logical recognition. CHAPTER 15 Camp Q: “Cue” is Quilty’s nickname. “The ‘Q,’ ” noted Nabokov, “had to be changed to ‘Kilt’ in the French translation because of the awful pun, Q = cul!” (which means “ass”). Botticellian pink: Sandro Botticelli (1444 or 1445–1510), master of the early Italian Renaissance, known for his tender renderings of sensual but melancholy femininity. That pink is most manifest in the vision of the three graces in his painting “Primavera,” while the “wet, matted eyelashes” suggest his famous “The Birth of Venus,” which H.H. invokes here and here. In Laughter in the Dark, blind Albinus tries to transform incoherent sounds into colors: “It was the opposite of trying to imagine the kind of voices which Botticelli’s angels had” (p. 242). her coccyx: the end of the vertebral column. iliac: anatomical word; pertaining to the ilium, “the dorsal and upper one of the three bones composing either lateral half of the pelvis.” Catullus ... forever: Gaius Valerius Catullus (c. 84–54 B.C.), Roman lyric, erotic, and epigrammatic poet. H.H.’s “that Lolita, my Lolita” echoes Catullus’s evocation of his enchanting Lesbia, as well as imitations such as “My sweetest Lesbia” (1601), by Thomas Campion (1567–1620), English poet. See the writer’s ancient lust and my Lolita ... her Catullus. D.P.: during and shortly after World War II, refugees were officially described as “Displaced Persons”; hence “D.P.”s. Berthe au Grand Pied: Bertha (or Bertrade) with the Big Feet (or Bigfoot Bertha); the epithet is not pejorative. A French historical figure (d. 783), she was Pépin le Bref’s wife and Charlemagne’s mother, and is alluded to by François Villon in his ballad with the refrain “Mais où sont les neiges d’antan?” mais rien: French; but nothing. CHAPTER 16 mon cher, cher monsieur: French; my dear, dear sir. Départez: the wrong French for “leave!”

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  [image file=image_rsrcA5N.jpg] THE MANY PEOPLE and the diverse wounds had made my eyes so drunken that they longed to stay and weep; but Virgil said to me: “Why art thou gazing still? wherefore does thy sight still rest, down there, among the dismal mutilated shadows? Thou hast not done so at the other chasms; consider, if thou thinkest to number them, that the valley goes round two-and-twenty miles;1 and the Moon already is beneath our feet;2 the time is now short, that is conceded to us; and other things are to be seen than thou dost see.” “Hadst thou,” I thereupon replied, “attended to the cause for which I looked, perhaps thou mightest have vouchsafed me yet to stay.” Meantime the Guide was going on; and I went behind him, now making my reply, and adding: “Within that cavern, where I kept my eyes so fixed, I believe that a spirit of my own blood laments the guilt which costs so much down there.” Then the Master said: “Let not thy thought henceforth distract itself on him; attend to somewhat else, and let him stay there: for I saw him, at the foot of the little bridge, point to thee, and vehemently threaten with his finger; and heard them call him Geri del Bello.3 Thou wast then so totally entangled upon him who once held Altaforte, that thou didst not look that way; so he departed.” “O my Guide! his violent death, which is not yet avenged for him,” said I, “by any that is a partner of his shame, made him indignant: therefore, as I suppose, he went away without speaking to me; and in that has made me pity him the more.” Thus we spake, up to the first place of the cliff, which shows the other valley, if more light were there, quite to the bottom. When we were above the last cloister of Malebolge, so that its lay-brethren could appear to our view, lamentations pierced me, manifold, which had their arrows barbed with pity; whereat I covered my ears with my hands. Such pain as there would be, if the diseases in the hospitals of Valdichiana, between July and September, and of Maremma and Sardinia,4 were all together in one ditch: such was there here; and such stench issued thence, as is wont to issue from putrid limbs. We descended on the last bank of the long cliff, again to the left hand; and then my sight was more vivid, down towards the depth in which the ministress of the Great Sire, infallible Justice, punishes the falsifiers that she here registers. I do not think it was a greater sorrow to see the people in Ægina all infirm; when the air was so malignant, that every animal, even to the little worm, dropt down; and afterwards, as Poets hold for sure, the ancient peoples were restored from seed of ants:5 than it was to see, through that dim valley, the spirits languishing in diverse heaps.

• From On Beauty (2005)

  Jerome gave his sister a look heavy with the implication that he expected more from her. He’d been laying this look on her since they were children, and now Zora defended herself as she always did, by attacking. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t like her. I can’t pretend I like her when I don’t. I do not like her. She’s just a typical pretty-girl, power-game playing, deeply shallow human being. She tries to hide it by reading one book by Barthes or whatever – all she does is quote Barthes; it’s so tedious – but then the bottom line is, whenever things get sticky for her she just works her charms to her advantage. It’s disgusting. Oh, my God, and she has this coterie of boys just following her everywhere, which is fine – obviously it’s pathetic, but whatever you need to make it through the day . . . but don’t fuck up the dynamic of the class with stupid questions that go nowhere. You know? And she’s vain. Wow, is she vain. You’re lucky to be out of that situation.’ Jerome looked pained. He hated hearing anybody bad-mouthed; anyone except Howard, maybe, and even then he preferred to do his own dirty work. Now he folded his muffin wrapper in half and passed it idly between his fingers like a playing card.  the anatomy lesson ‘You don’t know her at all. She’s not really that vain. She just hasn’t settled into her looks. She’s still young. She hasn’t decided what to do with it yet. It’s a powerful thing, you know, to look like that.’ Zora guffawed. ‘Oh, she’s decided. She’s using it as a force of evil.’ Jerome threw his eyes back in his head but laughed along. ‘You think I’m joking. She’s poisonous. She needs to be stopped. Before she destroys somebody else. I’m serious.’ This went too far. Zora sank into her stool a little, realizing. ‘You don’t have to say any of that – not for me, anyway,’ said Jerome crossly, confusing Zora, who had been expressing nothing but her own feelings. ‘Because . . . I don’t . . . I don’t love her any more.’ With this simplest of sentences all the air seemed to rush from him. ‘That’s what I found out this semester. It was hard – I willed myself. I actually thought I’d never get her face out of my system.’ Jerome looked down at the table top and then up and directly into his sister’s eyes. ‘But I did. I don’t love her any more.’ This was said with such solemnity and earnestness that Zora wanted to laugh, as they had always laughed in the past at moments like these. But nobody laughed. ‘I’m out,’ said Levi and bounced off his stool. Levi’s family turned to him in surprise. ‘I gotta go,’ he reiterated. ‘Back to school?’ asked Jerome, looking at his own watch.

• From On Beauty (2005)

  ‘ Howard ,’ said Kiki in such a tone that nothing further was said until Winchester Lane, where their journey ended. The car pulled up beside a little English country church, torn from its village surroundings and dropped into this urban suburb, or so it seemed to the Belsey children. In fact it was the countryside that had receded. Only a hundred years earlier, a mere five hundred souls had lived in this parish of sheep fields and orchards, land that they rented from an Oxford college, which institution still counts much of Willesden Green among its possessions. This was a country church. Standing in the pebbled forecourt under the bare branches of a cherry tree, Howard could almost imagine the busy main road completely vanished and in its place paddocks, hedgerows and eglantine, cobbled lanes.  On Beauty A crowd was gathering. It pooled around the First World War memorial, a simple pillar with an illegible inscription, every single word smoothed into the recess of its own stone. Most people were wearing black, but there were many, like the Belseys, who were not. A wiry little man, in a street cleaner’s orange tabard, was running two identical white bull terriers up and over the small mound of remaining garden between the vicarage and the church. He did not seem to be of the party. People looked after him disapprovingly; some tuts were heard. He continued to throw his stick. The two terriers persisted in bringing it back, their jaws clamped round it at either end, forming a new, perfectly coordinated eight-legged beast. ‘Every kind of person,’ whispered Jerome, because everybody was whispering. ‘You can tell she knew every type of person. Can you imagine a funeral – any event – this mixed, back home?’ The Belseys looked around themselves and saw the truth of this. Every age, every colour and several faiths; people dressed very finely – hats and handbags, pearls and rings – and people who were clearly of a different world again, in jeans and baseball caps, saris and duffle coats. And among them – joyfully – Erskine Jegede! It was not appropriate to whoop and wave; Levi was sent over to fetch him. He came over doing his bull’s stomp, dressed in natty racing-green tweed and brandishing an umbrella like a cane. All that was missing was the monocle. Looking at him now, Kiki could not work out why she hadn’t noticed it before. Despite Erskine’s more dandified stylings, sartorially, Monty and Erskine were a match. ‘Ersk, thank God you’re here,’ said Howard, hugging his friend. ‘But how come? I thought you were in Paris for Christmas.’

• From The Golden Ass (Metamorphoses) (2)

  And the cause why I had determined so to doe was this, I thought that the theeves when they did see me so feeble and weake that I could not travell, to the intent they would not stay in their journey, they would take the burthen from my backe and put it on my fellowes, and so for my further punishment to leave me as a prey to the wolves and ravening beasts. But evill fortune prevented so good a consideration; for the other Asse being of the same purpose that I was of, by feigned and coloured wearinesse fell downe first, with all his burthen on the ground as though hee were dead, and he would not rise neither with beating nor with pricking, nor stand upon his legs, though they pulled him by the tail, by his legs, and by his eares: which when the theeves beheld, as without all hope they said one unto another, What should we stand here so long about a dead or rather a stony asse? let us bee gone: and so they tooke his burthen, and divided some to mee, and some to my horse. And then they drew out their swords and cut off his legs, and threw his body from the point of a hill down into a great valley. Then I considering with my selfe of the evill fortune of my poore companion, and purposed now to forget all subtility and deceit, and to play the good Asse to get my masters favour, for I perceived by their talke that we were come home well nigh at our journeys end. And after that wee had passed over a little hill, we came to our appointed place, and when we were unladen of our burthens, and all things carried in, I tumbled and wallowed in the dust, to refresh my selfe in stead of water. The thing and the time compelleth me to make description of the places, and especially of the den where the theeves did inhabit, I will prove my wit in what I can doe, and the consider you whether I was an Asse in judgement and sence, or no. For first there was an exceeding great hill compassed about with big trees very high, with many turning bottoms full of sharp stones, whereby it was inaccessible. There was many winding and hollow vallies, environed with thickets and thornes, and naturally fortressed round about. From the top of the hill ranne a running water as cleare as silver, that watered all the valleyes below, that it seemed like unto a sea inclosed, or a standing floud. Before the denne where was no hill stood an high tower, and at the foot thereof were sheep-coats fenced and walled with clay. Before the gate of the house were pathes made in stead of wals, in such sort that you could easily judge it to be a very den for theeves, and there was nothing else except a little coat covered with thatch, wherein the theeves did nightly accustome to watch by order, as I after perceived. And when they were all crept into the house, and we were all tied fast with halters at the dore, they began to chide with an old woman there, crooked with age, who had the government and rule of all the house, and said, How is it old witch, old trot, and strumpet, that thou sittest idley all day at home, and having no regard to our perillous labours, hast provided nothing for our suppers, but sittest eating and swilling thyself from morning till night? Then the old woman trembled, and scantly able to speak gan say, Behold my puissant and faithfull masters, you shall have meat and pottage enough by and by: here is first store of bread, wine plenty, filled in cleane rinsed pots, likewise here is hot water prepared to bathe you.

• From On Beauty (2005)

  Even in the middle of a music library, they had forgotten what music was. Carl hit ‘Return’ with a pianist’s flourish. He sighed happily. He said, ‘Oh, man .’ He seemed to have overestimated Levi’s curiosity about the lives of other people. ‘Know who that was?’ he prompted finally. Levi shrugged. ‘Remember that girl? I first saw her when I was with you. The one with the booty that was just . . .’ Carl kissed the air. Levi did his best to look unimpressed. One thing he couldn’t stand was brothers boasting about their ladies. ‘That was her , man. I asked someone her name and found her in the college book. Easy as that. Victoria. Vee . She driving me crazy, man – she e-mails like . . .’ Carl lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘She so dirty. Photos and all’a that. She got a body like . . . I don’t even have any words for what she got. She be like sending me . . . well – you want to see something? Takes a minute to download.’ Carl clicked his mouse a few times and then began to turn his screen round. Levi had seen a quarter of a breast when they both heard Elisha coming down the hall. Carl whipped his computer back to face him, switched off the screen and picked up the newspaper. ‘Hey, Levi,’ said Elisha. ‘We got lucky. I found what you’re looking for. You want to come with me?’ Levi stood up and, without saying goodbye to Carl, followed Elisha out of the room.  On Beauty ‘Baby, you can’t lie to me. I can see it in your face.’ Kiki took Levi by the chin, tilted his head back and examined the swollen pockets of skin under the eyes, the blood that had leaked into his corneas, the dryness of his lips. ‘I’m just tired.’ ‘Tired my ass .’ ‘Let go of my chin.’ ‘I know you’ve been crying,’ insisted Kiki, but she didn’t know the half of it: couldn’t know, would never know, the lovely sadness of that Haitian music, or what it was like to sit in a small dark booth and be alone with it – the plangent, irregular rhythm, like a human heartbeat, the way the many harmonized voices had sounded, to Levi, like a whole nation weeping in tune. ‘I know things at home haven’t been good,’ said Kiki, looking into his red eyes. ‘But they’re going to get better, I promise you that. Your daddy and I are determined to make it better. OK?’ There was no point in explaining. Levi nodded and zipped up his coat. ‘The Bus Stop,’ said Kiki, and resisted the urge to deliver a curfew that would only be ignored. ‘You go and have fun.’ ‘You want a ride?’ asked Jerome, who was passing through the kitchen with Zora. ‘I’m not drinking.’

• From The Annotated Lolita (1991)

  Mnemosyne: in Greek mythology, a Titaness, daughter of Uranus and Gaea. She is associated with memory or remembrance. The nine Muses resulted from her union with Zeus. In the Foreword to the revised Speak, Memory, Nabokov says, “I had planned to entitle the British edition Speak, Mnemosyne but was told that ‘little old ladies would not want to ask for a book whose title they could not pronounce.’ ” Cantrip … Mimir: a cantrip is a charm or spell, while Mimir is a giant in Norse mythology who lived by the well at the root of Yggdrasill, the great tree symbolizing the universe. By drinking its water, he knew the past and future. travaux: French; works. très digne: French; very dignified. souvenir … veux-tu?: “memory, memory, what do you want of me?” The opening line (minus “l’automne,” the last word) of “Nevermore”(title in English), by Paul Verlaine (1844–1896). H.H. begins his next sentence with that last word. Memories awakened by The Enchanted Hunters bring this line to mind. Verlaine’s poem ends with the poet telling his beloved that his most perfect day was when she charmingly murmured “Le premier oui”—her first yes (see also Keys, p. 33). For further Verlaine allusions, see Mes fenětres and mon … radieux. H.H. identifies with Verlaine, who was abandoned by his much younger (and homosexual) lover and traveling companion, Rimbaud. In Pale Fire, Kinbote recalls a visit to Nice, and “an old bearded bum … who stood like a statute of Verlaine with an unfastidious sea gull perched in profile on his matted hair” (p. 170). Ada and Van Veen are touched by “the long sobs of the violins,” the opening lines of Verlaine’s Chanson d’automne (1866), translated and quietly absorbed into the text of Ada (p. 411). Van’s “assassin pun” (p. 541) puns on “la Pointe assassine,” line seventeen of Verlaine’s Art poétique (1882). “Verlaine had been also a teacher somewhere / In England. And what about Baudelaire, / Alone in his Belgian hell?” writes Nabokov in “Exile,” an uncollected poem (The New Yorker, October 24, 1942, p. 26). For Baudelaire, see oh Baudelaire!. petite … accroupie: nymphet crouching. spaniel … baptized: the old lady’s dog, with which Lolita had played (cocker spaniel). H.H. wonders if the hotel’s policy of “NO DOGS” had been broken to accommodate Christian dogs, because “NEAR CHURCHES” was commonly used (c. 1940–1960) as a code sign, a discreet indication that only Gentiles were accepted. A similar quid pro quo occurs in the same hotel when “Humbert” is misunderstood and distorted into a Jewish-sounding “Humberg,” just as “Professor Hamburg” now finds the hotel full. “Refugee” H.H. is often mistaken for a Jew; see here, where John Farlow is on the point of making an anti-Semitic remark and is interrupted by sensitive Jean. Quilty thinks H.H. may be a “German refugee,” and reminds him, “This is a Gentile’s house, you know” (a Gentile’s house).

• From The Annotated Lolita (1991)

  Now, I do not remember if I have mentioned that Lolita always had an absolutely enchanting smile for strangers, a tender furry slitting of the eyes, a dreamy sweet radiance of all her features which did not mean a thing of course, but was so beautiful, so endearing that one found it hard to reduce such sweetness to but a magic gene automatically lighting up her face in atavistic token of some ancient rite of welcome—hospitable prostitution, the coarse reader may say. Well, there she stood while Mr. Byrd twirled his hat and talked, and—yes, look how stupid of me, I have left out the main characteristic of the famous Lolita smile, namely: while the tender, nectared, dimpled brightness played, it was never directed at the stranger in the room but hung in its own remote flowered void, so to speak, or wandered with myopic softness over chance objects—and this is what was happening now: while fat Avis sidled up to her papa, Lolita gently beamed at a fruit knife that she fingered on the edge of the table, whereon she leaned, many miles away from me. Suddenly, as Avis clung to her father’s neck and ear while, with a casual arm, the man enveloped his lumpy and large offspring, I saw Lolita’s smile lose all its light and become a frozen little shadow of itself, and the fruit knife slipped off the table and struck her with its silver handle a freak blow on the ankle which made her gasp, and crouch head forward, and then, jumping on one leg, her face awful with the preparatory grimace which children hold till the tears gush, she was gone—to be followed at once and consoled in the kitchen by Avis who had such a wonderful fat pink dad and a small chubby brother, and a brand-new baby sister, and a home, and two grinning dogs, and Lolita had nothing. And I have a neat pendant to that little scene— also in a Beardsley setting. Lolita, who had been reading near the fire, stretched herself, and then inquired, her elbow up, with a grunt: “Where is she buried anyway?” “Who?” “Oh, you know, my murdered mummy.” “And you know where her grave is,” I said controlling myself, whereupon I named the cemetery—just outside Ramsdale, between the railway tracks and Lakeview Hill. “Moreover,” I added, “the tragedy of such an accident is somewhat cheapened by the epithet you saw fit to apply to it. If you really wish to triumph in your mind over the idea of death—” “Ray,” said Lo for hurray, and languidly left the room, and for a long while I stared with smarting eyes into the fire. Then I picked up her book.

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  [image file=image_rsrcA5N.jpg] NOW BY a secret path, between the city-wall and the torments, my Master goes on, and I behind him. “O Virtue supreme! who through the impious circles thus wheelest me, as it pleases thee,” I began; “speak to me, and satisfy my wishes. Might these people, who lie within the sepulchres, be seen? the covers are all raised, and none keeps guard.” And he to me: “All shall be closed up, when, from Jehosaphat, they return here with the bodies which they have left above. In this part are entombed with Epicurus all his followers, who make the soul die with the body.1 Therefore to the question, which thou asketh me, thou shalt soon have satisfaction here within; and also to the Wish which thou holdest from me.”2 And I: “Kind Guide, I do not keep my heart concealed from thee, except for brevity of speech, to which thou hast ere now disposed me.”3 “O Tuscan! who through the city of fire goest alive, speaking thus decorously; may it please thee to stop in this place. Thy speech clearly shows thee a native of that noble country, which perhaps I vexed too much.” Suddenly this sound issued from one of the chests; whereat in fear I drew a little closer to my Guide. And he said to me: “Turn thee round; what art thou doing? lo there Farinata! 4 who has raised himself erect; from the girdle upwards thou shalt see him all.” Already I had fixed my look on his; and he rose upright with breast and countenance, as if he entertained great scorn of Hell; and the bold and ready hands of my Guide pushed me amongst the sepultures to him, saying: “Let thy words be numbered.” When I was at the foot of his tomb, he looked at me a little; and then, almost contemptuously, he asked me: “Who were thy ancestors?” I, being desirous to obey, concealed it not; but opened the whole to him:5 whereupon he raised his brows a little; then he said: “Fiercely adverse were they to me, and to my progenitors, and to my party; so that twice I scattered them.”6 “If they were driven forth, they returned from every quarter, both times,” I answered him; “but yours have not rightly learnt that art.” Then, beside him, there rose a shadow,7 visible to the chin; it had raised itself, I think, upon its knees. It looked around me, as if it had a wish to see whether some one were with me; but when all its expectation was quenched, it said, weeping: “If through this blind prison thou goest by height of genius, where is my son8 and why is he not with thee?” And I to him: “Of myself I come not: he, that waits yonder, leads me through this place; whom perhaps thy Guido held in disdain.”9 Already his words and the manner of his punishment had read his name to me: hence my answer was so full.

• From The Divine Comedy (1950)

  Chiron bent round on his right breast, and said to Nessus: “Turn, and guide them then; and if another troop encounter you, keep it off.” We moved onwards with our trusty guide, along the border of the purple boiling, wherein the boiled were making loud shrieks. I saw people down in it even to the eyebrows; and the great Centaur said: “These are tyrants who took to blood and plunder. Here they lament their merciless offences; here is Alexander;9 and fierce Dionysius,10 who made Sicily have years of woe; and that brow which has the hair so black is Azzolino;11 and that other, who is blonde, is Obizzo of Este,12 who in verity was quenched by his stepson up in the world.” Then I turned me to the Poet, and he said: “Let him be chief guide to thee now, and me second.” A little farther on, the Centaur paused beside a people which, as far as the throat, seemed to issue from that boiling stream. He showed us a spirit by itself apart, saying: “That one, in God’s bosom, pierced the heart which still is venerated on the Thames.”13 Then some I saw, who kept the head and likewise all the chest out of the river; and of these I recognized many. Thus more and more that blood grew shallow, until it cooked the feet only; and here was our passage through the fosse. “As thou seest the boiling stream, on this side, continually diminish,” said the Centaur, “so I would have thee to believe that, on this other, it lowers its bottom more and more, till it comes again to where tyranny is doomed to mourn.14 Divine Justice here torments that Attila,15 who was a scourge on earth; and Pyrrhus and Sextus;16 and to eternity milks tears, which by the boiling it unlocks, from Rinier of Corneto, from Rinier Pazzo,17 who on the highways made so much war.” Then he turned back, and repassed the ford.

• From On Beauty (2005)

  ‘Yes – there was an older gentleman here, Mr Weingarten – he was a dialysis patient at the hospital where I work, so he got picked up by an ambulance, you know, three or four times a week, and one day they arrived and they found him in the garden – it’s terrible, actually – he was burned to death – apparently he had a lighter in his pocket, in his bathrobe – he was probably trying to light a cigarette – which he should not have been doing – anyway, he went and set fire to himself, and I guess he just couldn’t put it out. It’s pretty awful – I don’t know why I told you that. I’m sorry.’ This last was untrue – she was not sorry she had told the story. She had wanted to kick-start this woman somehow. ‘Oh, no, my dear,’ said Mrs Kipps, rather impatiently, dismissive of so obvious a ploy to unbalance her. Kiki noticed for the first time the shake in her head also extended to her left hand. ‘I already knew that – the lady next door told my husband.’  kipps and belsey ‘Oh, OK. It’s just so sad . Living alone and all.’ To this, Mrs Kipps’s face responded at once – it crumpled and distorted like a child’s when given caviar or wine. Her front teeth came forward as the skin on her jaw pulled back. She looked ghastly. Kiki thought for a moment it was a kind of seizure, but then her face healed over. ‘It is so awful to me, that idea,’ Mrs Kipps said passionately. Once again she gripped Kiki’s hand, this time with both of her own. The deeply lined black palms reminded Kiki of her own mother’s. The fragility of the grasp – the feeling that one need only release one’s own five fingers from it and this other person’s hand would smash into pieces. Kiki was shamed out of her pique. ‘Oh, God, I’d hate to live alone,’ she said, before considering whether this was still true. ‘But you’ll like it here in Wellington – generally, we all take care of each other pretty well. It’s a community-minded kind of a place. Reminds me a lot of parts of Florida that way.’ ‘But when we drove through town I saw so many poor souls living on the street!’ Kiki had lived in Wellington long enough not to be able to quite trust people who spoke of injustice in this faux naive manner, as if no one had ever noticed the injustice before. ‘Well,’ she said evenly, ‘we’ve certainly got a situation down there – there’s a lot of very recent immigrants too, lot of Haitians, lot of Mexicans, a lot of folk just out there with no place to go. It’s not so bad in the winter when the shelters open up. But, no . . .

• From On Beauty (2005)

  ‘I think . . .’ murmured Carlene and smiled tenderly at her guest, ‘I think that would be a shame.’ Kiki closed her eyes. ‘Wow. I hate this town sometimes. Everybody knows everybody’s business. Too small by a long way.’ ‘Oh, but I’m so glad to see that your spirits haven’t been destroyed by it.’ ‘Oh!’ said Kiki, and felt moved by the unsolicited concern. ‘We’ll get by. I’ve been married an awful long time, Carlene. Takes a giant to hurt me.’ Carlene leant back in her chair. Her eyes were pink round their rims and wet. ‘But why shouldn’t you be hurt by it, dear? It’s very hurtful.’ ‘Yes . . . of course it is – but . . . I guess I mean that’s not all my life is about. Right now I’m trying to understand what my life’s been for – I feel I’m at that point – and what it will be for. And . . . that’s just a lot more essential for me right now. And Howard’s got to ask those questions for himself. I don’t know . . . we break up, we don’t break up – it’s the same.’ ‘I don’t ask myself what did I live for,’ said Carlene strongly. ‘That is a man’s question. I ask whom did I live for.’ ‘Oh, I don’t believe you believe that.’ But, looking into her grave eyes, Kiki saw clearly that this is exactly what the woman opposite her did believe, and she felt suddenly vexed by the waste and stupidity of it. ‘I have to say, Carlene, you know . . . I’m afraid I just don’t believe that. I know I didn’t live for anybody – and it just seems to me it’s like taking us all, all women, certainly all black women, three hundred years backwards if you really – ’ ‘Oh, dear, we’re arguing,’ said Carlene, distressed at the prospect. ‘You mistake me again. I don’t mean to argue a case. It’s just a feeling I have, especially now. I see very clearly recently that in fact I didn’t live for an idea or even for God – I lived because I loved this person. I am very selfish, really. I lived for love. I never really interested myself in the world – my family, yes, but not the world. I can’t make a case for my life, but it is true.’ Kiki regretted raising her voice. The lady was old, the lady was ill. It didn’t matter what the lady believed.  the anatomy lesson ‘You must have a wonderful marriage,’ she said in conciliation. ‘That’s amazing. But for us . . . you know . . . you get to a point where you have an understanding – ’ Carlene shushed her and came forward further in her chair. ‘Yes, yes. But you staked your life . You gave somebody your life . You’ve been disappointed.’

• From I'm Not a Mourning Person (2023)

  Just then the doorbell rang, and there was the hospice doctor. This was the first time I had met him. I invited him in and steadied myself and my COVID mask for the conversation about Dad’s status. The pandemic was good for one thing: those damn masks helped me hide my quivering lips whenever I was attempting to choke back tears. (Having become more emotionally brave, I’d retired the anchovies and dead mice by then.) “We’re going to take good care of you, Ken,” the doctor said. “And we’re going to make sure that you’re comfortable, but at this point you know we can’t fix the disease, right?” “Yes, I do, Doctor,” Dad replied, as I could feel the tears welling. “Now is a good time to tie up any loose ends, too. Have you sorted out your will yet?” “Yes, I’m all set there.” “Have you chosen if you want to be buried or cremated?” “Yes. I’ve decided to be cremated.” “Are you religious?” “I follow my own path with that.” “Well, if you want to see the chaplain, just let us know and we’ll send him.” You got this, Kris. You got this. Hold fast. Damn, this was rough. “What about porn?” My sorrow instantly shut down. Dad looked stunned, so the doctor continued, “While you can still get around with your walker, you might want to get rid of it if you have any. This way no one else will have to deal with it after you’re gone.” Dad burst into laughter. “That won’t be a problem, Doctor.” From then on, “Dr. Porn,” as we took to calling him, was Dad’s favorite, straight-shooting visitor. At first, hospice scared me because I was a newbie and had no clue what to expect. For instance, I didn’t know that hospice was a service, not a place (though there are hospice facilities). Multiple times per week, a team of compassionate nurses and other professionals skilled at end-of-life care came to check on Dad. They monitored his vitals and adjusted his medications. They groomed and bathed him, allowing my mom more time to just be his wife. They ordered medical supplies and equipment like a hospital bed, wheelchair, and walker. They even offered grief counseling for us all and continued to provide it for over a year past his death. During the final hours, they were with us 24-7, teaching us what was happening and how to respond to it. When we freaked out because Dad’s stomach was filling up with fluid, they gently explained that this was normal. His liver was starting to shut down, which was why his legs were also so swollen. Luckily, they were able to drain his abdomen every other day, providing him relief.

• From I'm Not a Mourning Person (2023)

  This is to be expected, and so is the lengthy amount of time it takes to feel like a human being who wants to get out of pajamas as a complete wardrobe and wash her hair again. That’s because grief isn’t linear. It will work us over in whatever way it wants, and on its own damn schedule. We can’t just snap our fingers and be done with the devastation. We also can’t amputate any of our emotions and expect to be whole. Believe me, I’ve tried. For most of my life, I’ve done everything in my power to run from the big, scary feelings explored in this book—the socially unacceptable emotions that we’re not “supposed” to feel, like rage, powerlessness, and utter despair. But a few years ago, when my father was dying, my world was falling apart, and I was on the verge of reaching my 20-year milestone of living with my own shit pickle—a stage IV cancer diagnosis (yup, it’s not gone, neat, or tidy)—I suddenly lost the energy to run. So I decided to try something different: I stopped and faced my feelings. Eager to find a framework that resonated, I began researching how grief and other difficult emotions affect our brains, bodies, and lives—even when we’re unaware of it. Could understanding these big kahunas help me understand myself and others better? Could accepting grief as a part of me that needed to be cared for—just like my skin or heart or the dozens of tumors that I’ve learned to coexist with—help me feel even the slightest bit whole again? I didn’t know, but I needed to try. So, I slowly and gently started applying the practices, insights, and therapies I was discovering to my own pain, and over time, I eventually began to feel better—not cured, but better. Which is exactly what can happen for you. Let’s be honest: feelings are slippery little suckers. When we deny them, they get pissed off and come out in other, more destructive ways. Uncared for pain can morph into anger, violence, addiction, anxiety, hypervigilance, hyperdrive, guilt, procrastination, hopelessness, and, of course, the consuming of copious amounts of wine. It shrinks our worlds and makes us feel stuck—at home, at work, in our bodies, in our relationships, and in our hearts. Burying pain can also make us sick or, at the very least, constipated. But here’s what can happen when we’re brave enough to take care of our hearts: our messy emotions can teach us how to be free—not free from pain but free from the fear of pain and the barrier it creates to fully living.

• From I'm Not a Mourning Person (2023)

  “Me, too, Dad,” I said reflexively. When I thought about it, though, I wasn’t sure if it was true. In order to really be able to talk about “anything,” I’d have to learn how to talk about dying. Why was this so hard? I bought books on Buddhism, listened to the meditations, took the classes, and hired the professionals. But nothing prepared me for this. We learn so many important skills for navigating life. Essential hygiene practices: check. Don’t take rides from strangers: check. How to use jumper cables: check (or just call AAA). Supporting someone we love through their last breath: crickets. Even with all the preparation in the world—even when we think we know what we’re doing—practicing it is a whole other skill. Dad had opened a big door, one he needed to explore, but I wasn’t capable of accompanying him through it yet, so I hid behind anal prolapses as an escape from my own discomfort. The next night, we celebrated his birthday at a beautiful restaurant with a gorgeous view of the water. The air was warm, salty, and slightly breezy—the temperature just right. The ocean shimmered like a Monet painting sparkling with magic-hour light. Even our table was the best in the house (I made sure of it, as I didn’t want to leave anything to chance). Dad ordered a great bottle of wine, as he always did. Brian, my normally stoic husband, was tasked with kicking off the birthday toast. One sentence in, his lips began quivering, unleashing a chain reaction of feels that rippled throughout the table. Mom’s eyes welled up. I retreated to my mental safe house—What would it be like to be the ocean? I wondered, as I willed my tears away with thoughts. Something that endures and remains no matter how life changes. But I wasn’t the ocean; I was a hurting human, surrounded by other hurting humans who didn’t know how to express their big feelings, let alone realize that it might be appropriate. Just then Dad swooped in to save us, allowing us to breathe again. “Thank you for coming here to celebrate this special day with me,” he said, gazing at the ocean I was trying to become. “You know, if I could do it all again, I’d give myself more like this. Summer has always been my busy season. And even though I could have, I rarely took a day off to experience something like this. So figure out what your ‘more like this’ looks like and make it happen sooner; don’t save it for your golden years.” Before I had a chance to let his words sink in, words that would become my compass in this next stage of life, he lobbed the final bomb that demolished my brittle defenses. “I hope you’ll all come back here on my birthday from time to time. This is a good spot to remember me. I love you all.”

• From On Beauty (2005)

  ‘by apologizing for things that were no fault of yours.’ ‘No,’ said Kiki. She meant to continue, but, once again, everything fell away. She just knew she could no longer crouch. She took her feet out from under her and sat down on the wood. ‘Yes, you sit down and we can talk properly. Whatever problems our husbands may have, it’s no quarrel of ours.’ Nothing followed. Kiki felt and saw herself in this unlikely position, sitting on the floor beneath a woman she did not know. She looked out over the garden and sighed stupidly, as if the charm of the scene had only this moment struck her. ‘Now, what do you think,’ Mrs Kipps said slowly, ‘of my house?’ This question, implicit in Kiki’s social dealings with the women of Wellington, was another she had never been asked outright before. ‘Well, I think it’s absolutely lovely.’ This answer seemed to surprise the occupant. She moved forward, lifting her chin from where it rested on her chest. ‘ Really . I cannot say that I like it so much. It’s so new . There’s nothing in this house except money, jangling. My house in London, Mrs Belsey – ’ ‘Kiki, please.’ ‘ Carlene ,’ she replied, pressing a long hand to her own, exposed  On Beauty throat. ‘It’s so full of humanity – I could hear petticoats in the hallway. I miss it so much, already. American houses . . .’ she said, peering over her right shoulder and down the street. ‘They always seem to believe that nobody ever loses anything, has ever lost anything. I find that very sad. Do you know what I mean?’ Kiki instinctively bristled – after a lifetime of bad-mouthing her own country, these past few years she had grown into a new sensitivity. She had to leave the room when Howard’s English friends settled into their armchairs after dinner and began the assault. ‘American houses? How do you mean? You mean, you’d rather a house with, like, a history?’ ‘Oh . . . well, it can be put this way, yes.’ Kiki was further wounded by the sense she had said something to disappoint, or, worse, something so dull it was not worth replying to. ‘But you know, actually this house does have a kind of history, Mrs – Carlene – it’s not a very pretty one, though.’ ‘Mmm.’ Now this was simply impolite. Mrs Kipps had closed her eyes. The woman was rude. Wasn’t she? Maybe it was a cultural difference. Kiki pressed on.

• From Fear of Flying (1973)

  You used the analyst as a substitute for everything. Whenever any kind of closeness threatened, you sent me to a goddamned analyst.” “Where the hell would you be now without the analyst? You’d still be rewriting one poem over and over. You’d still be unable to send work anywhere. You’d still be terrified of everything. When I met you, you were running around like a lunatic, never working steadily at anything, full of a million plans that never got finished. I gave you a place to work, encouraged you when you hated yourself, believed in you when you didn’t believe in yourself, paid for your goddamned analyst so you could grow and develop as a human being instead of floundering around with all the other members of your crazy family. Go blame me for all your problems. I was the only one who ever gave you support and encouragement and this is all you can do in return—go running after some asshole Englishman and whining to me about not knowing what you want. Go to hell! Follow him wherever you want, I’m going back to New York.” “But I want you ,” I said, crying. I wanted to want him. I wanted it more than anything. I thought of all the times we’d spent together, the miserable times we’d come through together, the times when we’d been able to comfort each other and encourage each other, the way he’d stood behind my work and steadied me when I looked as if I was ready to hurl myself off some cliff. The way I’d endured the army with him. The years put in. I thought of all we knew about each other, the way we’d worked to stay together, the stubborn determination that had held us together when all else failed. Even the misery we’d shared seemed a greater bond than anything I had with Adrian. Adrian was a dream. Bennett was my reality. Was he grim? Well then, reality was grim. If I lost him, I wouldn’t be able to remember my own name. We put our arms around each other and began to make love, crying. “I wanted to give you a baby there,” he said, thrusting deeper and deeper into me. The next afternoon I was back with Adrian, lying on a blanket in the Vienna woods, the sun coming down through the trees. “Do you really like Bennett or do you just enumerate his virtues?” Adrian asked. I picked a long green weed and chewed it. “Why do you ask such incisive questions?” “I’m not incisive at all. You’re just transparent.” “Great,” I said. “I mean it. Don’t you think fun figures at all in life? Or is it all this sickly stuff about ‘my analysis—his analysis,’ ‘love-me-love-my-disease.’ You and Bennett do seem to whine an awful lot. And apologize an awful lot.

• From My Year of Rest and Relaxation (2018)

  My brain? It made no sense. Irritation was what I knew best—a heaviness on my chest, a vibration in my neck like my head was revving up before it would rocket off my body. But that seemed directly tied to my nervous system—a physiological response. Was sadness the same kind of thing? Was joy? Was longing? Was love? In the time I had to kill there in the dark of Reva’s childhood bedroom, I decided I would test myself to see what was left of my emotions, what kind of shape I was in after so much sleep. My hope was that I’d healed enough over half a year’s hibernation, I’d become immune to painful memories. So I thought back to my father’s death again. I had been very emotional when it happened. I figured any tears I still had left to cry might be about him. “Your father wants to spend his last days in the house,” my mother had said on the phone. “Don’t ask me why.” He had been dying in the hospital for weeks already, but now he wanted to die at home. I left school and took the train up to see him the very next day, not because I thought it would mean so much to him to have me there, but to prove to my mother that I was a better person than she was: I was willing to be inconvenienced by someone else’s suffering. And I didn’t expect that my father’s suffering would bother me very much. I barely knew him. His illness had been secretive, as though it were part of his work, something that ought not concern me, and nothing I’d ever understand. I missed a week of classes sitting at home, watching him wither. A huge bed had been installed in the den, along with various pieces of medical equipment that I tried to ignore. One of two nurses was always there, feeling my father’s pulse, swabbing his mouth with a soggy little sponge on a stick, pumping him with painkillers. My mother stayed mostly in her bedroom, alone, coming out every now and then to fill a glass with ice. She’d tiptoe into the den to whisper something to the nurse, hardly saying a word to me, barely looking at my father. I sat on the armchair by his bed pretending to read a course packet on Picasso. I didn’t want to embarrass my father by staring, but it was hard not to. His hands had grown bony and huge. His eyes had sunk into his skull and darkened. His skin had thinned.

• From On Beauty (2005)

  Harold’s face creased into the picture of distressed aesthetic sensitivity, as if Howard had just put his foot through The Mona Lisa . The Mona Lisa . A painting Harold loves. When Howard was having his first pieces of criticism printed in the sorts of papers Harold never buys, a customer of Harold’s had shown the butcher a cutting of his son writing enthusiastically about Piero Manzoni’s Merda d’Artista . Harold closed the shop and went down the road with a handful of twopence to use the phone. ‘Shit in a jar? Why can’t you write about somefing lovely, like The Mona Lisa ? Your mum would be so proud of that. Shit in a jar? ’ ‘There’s no need for that, Howard,’ said Harold soothingly now. ‘It’s just my way of talking – I ain’t seen you in so long, just happy to see you, aren’t I, just trying to find something to say, you know . . .’  On Beauty Howard, with what he considered to be superhuman effort, said nothing further. Together they watched Countdown . Harold passed his son a little white pad on which to do his calculations. Howard scored well through the word round, doing better than both the contestants of the show. Meanwhile Harold struggled. His highest was a five-letter word. But in the numbers round, the power changed hands. There are always a few things our parents know about us that nobody else does. Harold Belsey was the only person who knew that when it came to the manipulation of numbers, Dr Howard Belsey, M.A., Ph.D., was a mere child. Even the most basic of multiplications required a calculator. He had been able to hide this for more than twenty years in seven different universities. But in Harold’s living room the truth would out. ‘One hundred and fifty-six,’ announced Harold, which was the target amount. ‘What you got, son?’ ‘A hundred and . . . No, I’m nowhere. Nothing.’ ‘Got you, Professor!’ ‘You did.’ ‘Yeah, well . . .’ agreed Harold, nodding as the contestant on the television explained her rather convoluted ‘workings out’. ‘ ’Course you can do it that way, love, but mine’s a damn sight prettier.’ Howard laid down his pen and pressed his hands to his temples. ‘You all right, Howard? You’ve had a face like a smacked arse since you got in here. Everything all right at home?’ Howard looked up at his father and decided to do something he never did. Tell him the truth. He expected nothing from this course of action. He was talking to the wallpaper as much as to this man. ‘No, it’s not all right.’ ‘No? What’s the matter? Oh, God, no one’s dead, are they, son? I couldn’t stand it if anyone’s dead!’ ‘ No one’s dead,’ said Howard. ‘Bloody out with it, then – you’ll give me a heart attack.’