Colin

“I ran upstairs, loving, weeping. I will run downstairs, unloving, not weeping.”
― Fay Weldon, The Life and Loves of a She Devil

“It is impossible to persuade a man who does not disagree but smiles.”
― Muriel Spark

“Thank you," he said. "I'm glad you enjoyed it. If there is anyone here this afternoon whom I have convinced that books are meant to be enjoyed, that English is nothing to do with duty, that it has nothing to do with school - with exercises and homework and ticks and crosses - then I am a happy man." He turned away but then he turned back again and he suddenly simply shouted, he bellowed "To hell with school," he cried. "To hell with school. English is what matters. ENGLISH IS LIFE." The Head grabbed him and led him off to her sitting-room for tea, not looking too thrilled, and we were let out and I went flying home.”
― Jane Gardam, A Long Way from Verona

“It is mere wishful thinking to imagine that the persecuted and the oppressed will unite out of solidarity and man the barricades together against a ruthless oppressor. In reality, two children of the same abusive father will not necessarily make common cause, brought close together by their shared fate. Often each sees in the other not a partner in misfortune but in fact the image of their common oppressor. That may well be the case with the hundred-year-old conflict between Arabs and Jews. The Europe that abused, humiliated and oppressed the Arabs by means of Imperialism, colonialism, exploitation and repression is the same Europe that oppressed and persecuted the Jews, and eventually allowed or even helped the Germans to root them out of every corner of the continent and murder almost all of them. But when the Arabs look at us they see not a bunch of half-hysterical survivors but a new offshoot of Europe, with its colonialism, technical sophistication and exploitation, that has cleverly returned to the Middle East - in Zionist guise this time - to exploit, evict and oppress all over again. Whereas when we look at them we do not see fellow victims either, brothers in adversity, but somehow we see pogrom-making Cossacks, bloodthirsty antisemites, Nazis in disguise, as though our European persecutors have reappeared here in the Land of Israel, put keffiyehs on their heads and grown moustaches, but are still our old murderers interested only in slitting Jews' throats for fun”
― Amos Oz, A Tale of Love and Darkness