I’d like to start a list of the most evocative moments or images in literature. This would usually not include dialogue; there are websites full of snappy quotes from almost every novel (I know, I counted; just kidding). I could probably have an entire conversation using dialogue from Some Kind of Wonderful (see Good Movies at top) and The Breakfast Club. But I have been haunted, recently, by a moment from Anne of Green Gables (AGG).
Near the end of AGG (page 277; took me 1 1/2 seconds to find it), Anne goes to Queens and Diana … nevermind, here it is:
The day finally came when Anne must go to town. She and Matthew drove in one fine September morning, after a tearful parting with Diana and an untearful, practical one–on Marilla’s side at least–with Marilla. But when Anne had gone Diana dried her tears and went to a beach picnic at White Sands with some of her Carmody cousins, where she contrived to enjoy herself tolerably well; while Marilla plunged fiercely into unnecessary work and kept at it all day long with the bitterest kind of heartache–the ache that burns and gnaws and cannot wash itself away in ready tears. But that night, when Marilla went to bed, acutely and miserably conscious that the little gable room at the end of the hall was untenanted by any vivid young life and unstirred by any soft breathing, she buried her face in her pillow, and wept for her girl in a passion of sobs that appalled her when she grew calm enough to reflect how very wicked it must be to take on so about a sinful fellow creature.
I can’t read that without crying myself. I feel that way about my children, and my mom and the wonderful friends I’ve made these many moons (sorry, Dad, it’s kind of a girl thing. And Dick, however many times you leave towels on the floor and forget the trash and do the dishes wrong and ask the girls “Do you want me to yell like Mom?”, I can’t imagine a parting).
Maybe now that I’ve gotten it down on paper it will stop turning up, and allow me to think of some more.
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Thank goodness for modern technology and transportation. We can take trips quickly and keep in touch when we do. I can’t imagine how the pioneers did it – never knowing how family and friends left behind were faring. Even letters are a far cry from e-mails, IMs, and telephone calls. Not to mention blogging! I very much remember this passage from AGG. Very touching – especially because it’s Marilla.
Today I had to teach the kids in Primary a Mother’s Day song. When we talked about the words, “When I am near you, I want to hear you, singing so softly that you love me to,” I got all emotional. So silly. Yet, I haven’t seen my mother for almost a year now and I miss her!!! I also hate when Mike has to go on Temporary Leave. You’d think that being busy with the little boys I wouldn’t care as much but no matter how many times he leaves, I always hate it.
ok, ok, enough with the weepies. (Adrianne, I am such a sucker for primary songs. When my family came to visit for the first time when tom and i were in harlem, one of my four callings was sac’t mtg conductor. we sang “families can be together forever” that sunday and i just bawled).
another evocative moment which evokes revulsion (in me) is a sensory image from Milan Kundera’s the unbearable lightness of being, in which the young wife knows her husband has continued his womanizing ways because, even though he showers after his trysts, he neglects to shampoo his hair, and so his hair retains the smell of his activities. NOT my favorite novel, but what an image!
And here’s the last scene from Kafka’s The Trial (not to say that I am a big Kafka reader; but I did so identify with this one, probably helped by the timing of when i first read it. tom was assigned it at columbia, around the time that we were evicted (well, the real tenant was; we were sub-leasing, illegally, unbeknownst to us, naturally). i was 9 months pregnant and our experience with sleazy city lawyers at the famous courthouse in downtown manhattan was just … surreal:
Un, what?
[...] the same topic on the same day. I’d like to host a carnival; this was kind of my idea with my literature post, but I hadn’t quite thought it all out yet. Last week I found a weekly carnival on Rocks [...]
[...] the same topic on the same day. I’d like to host a carnival; this was kind of my idea with my literature post, but I hadn’t quite thought it all out yet. Last week I found a weekly carnival on Rocks [...]