When you are a child you are yourself and you know and see everything prophetically. And then suddenly something happens and you stop being yourself; you become what others force you to be. You lose your wisdom and your soul. Jean Rhys More Quotes by Jean Rhys More Quotes From Jean Rhys It's funny, he said, have you ever thought that a girl's clothes cost more than the girl inside them? Jean Rhys clothes cost girl Not that she objected to solitude. Quite the contrary. She had books, thank Heaven, quantities of books. All sorts of books. Jean Rhys solitude heaven book The woman had a humble, cringing manner. Of course, she had discovered that, having neither money nor virtue, she had better be humble if she knew what was good for her. Jean Rhys virtue humility humble Love was a terrible thing. You poisoned it and stabbed at it and knocked it down into the mud - well down - and it got up and staggered on, bleeding and muddy and awful. Like - like Rasputin. Jean Rhys rasputin down-and awful It was the darkness that got you. It was heavy darkness, greasy and compelling. It made walls round you, and shut you in so that you felt like you could not breathe. Jean Rhys wall like-you darkness ...morbidly, attracted him to strangeness, to recklessnesss, even unhappiness. Jean Rhys strangeness unhappiness The rumble of the life outside was like the sound of the sea which was rising gradually around her. Jean Rhys rising sea sound What you take to be hyprocrisy is sometimes a certain caution, sometimes genuine, though ponderous, childish, sometimes a mixture of both. Jean Rhys genuine mixtures sometimes It was like letting go and falling back into water and seeing yourself grinning up through the water, your face like a mask, and seeing the bubbles coming up as if you were trying to speak from under the water. And how do you know what it's like to try to speak from under water when you're drowned? Jean Rhys letting-go water fall very few people change after well say seven or seventeen. Not really. They get more this or more that and of course look a bit different. But inside they are the same. Jean Rhys different change people before I could read, almost a baby, I imagined that God, this strange thing or person I heard about, was a book. Jean Rhys strange baby book There is no doubt that running away on a fresh, blue morning can be exhilarating. Jean Rhys running morning adventure Even the one moment that you thought was your eternity fades out and is forgotten and dies. Jean Rhys moments eternity forgotten As it was in the beginning, ... is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Jean Rhys holy-rosary ends world It is strange how sad it can be - sunlight in the afternoon, don't you think? Jean Rhys afternoon strange thinking I took the red dress down and put it against myself. 'Does it make me look intemperate and unchaste?' I said. Jean Rhys dresses doe looks Every word I say has chains round its ankles; every thought I think is weighted with heavy weights. Since I was born, hasn't every word I've said, every thought I've thought, everything I've done, been tied up, weighted, chained? And mind you, I know that with all this I don't succeed. Or I succeed in flashes only too damned well. ...But think how hard I try and how seldom I dare. Think - and have a bit of pity. That is, if you ever think, you apes, which I doubt. Jean Rhys doubt mind thinking I like shape very much. A novel has to have shape, and life doesn't have any. Jean Rhys novel shapes I often want to cry. That is the only advantage women have over men — at least they can cry. Jean Rhys cry want men Would you like a whiskey?' I say. 'I've got some.' (That's original. I bet nobody's ever thought of that way of bridging the gap before.) Jean Rhys gaps whiskey way
