Summer quotes
The lines readers remember from Summer, by Edith Wharton.
21 quotes · About the book
Standout lines
Her heart was ravaged by life’s cruelest discovery: the first creature who had come toward her out of the wilderness had brought her anguish instead of joy.
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She meant to take out of the drawer her roll of lace and the library register, and go straight to Miss Hatchard to announce her resignation. But suddenly a great desolation overcame her, and she sat down and laid her face against the desk.
Her heart was ravaged by life’s cruelest discovery: the first creature who had come toward her out of the wilderness had brought her anguish instead of joy.
She did not cry; tears came hard to her, and the storms of her heart spent themselves inwardly. But as she sat there in her dumb woe she felt her life to be too desolate, too ugly and intolerable.
A new note in his voice disarmed her: no one had ever spoken to her in that tone.
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“Look here—you don’t mean what you said? You don’t really think I’d do anything to hurt you?”
A new note in his voice disarmed her: no one had ever spoken to her in that tone.
“Oh, what did you do it for then?” she wailed. He had her hands in his, and she was feeling the smooth touch that she had imagined the day before on the hillside.
She had always thought of love as something confused and furtive, and he made it as bright and open as the summer air.
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She had lived all her life among people whose sensibilities seemed to have withered for lack of use; and more wonderful, at first, than Harney’s endearments were the words that were a part of them.
She had always thought of love as something confused and furtive, and he made it as bright and open as the summer air.
On the morrow of the day when she had shown him the way to the deserted house he had packed up and left Creston River for Boston;
The first fall of night after a day of radiance often gave her a sense of hidden menace: it was like looking out over the world as it would be when love had gone from it.
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Charity’s heart contracted.
The first fall of night after a day of radiance often gave her a sense of hidden menace: it was like looking out over the world as it would be when love had gone from it.
She wondered if some day she would sit in that same place and watch in vain for her lover. …
She had never known how to adapt herself; she could only break and tear and destroy.
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The more she thought of these things the more the sense of fatality weighed on her: she felt the uselessness of struggling against the circumstances.
She had never known how to adapt herself; she could only break and tear and destroy.
The scene with Ally had left her stricken with shame at her own childish savagery. What would Harney have thought if he had witnessed it?
Come to my age, a man knows the things that matter and the things that don’t; that’s about the only good turn life does us.
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“Ain’t it?” He looked at his watch. “Well, I’ll tell you another thing. All I want is to know if you’ll marry me. If there was anything else, I’d tell you so; but there ain’t.
Come to my age, a man knows the things that matter and the things that don’t; that’s about the only good turn life does us.
”
All quotes
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Chapter I
Old houses? Everything’s old in North Dormer, isn’t it? The folks are, anyhow.
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She stared. “
Old houses? Everything’s old in North Dormer, isn’t it? The folks are, anyhow.
”
Chapter II
Do you suppose anybody’d stay at North Dormer if they could help it? You wouldn’t, folks say!
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Her contempt flashed out. “
Do you suppose anybody’d stay at North Dormer if they could help it? You wouldn’t, folks say!
”
Chapter III
Her heart was ravaged by life’s cruelest discovery: the first creature who had come toward her out of the wilderness had brought her anguish instead of joy.
Show the passage
She meant to take out of the drawer her roll of lace and the library register, and go straight to Miss Hatchard to announce her resignation. But suddenly a great desolation overcame her, and she sat down and laid her face against the desk.
Her heart was ravaged by life’s cruelest discovery: the first creature who had come toward her out of the wilderness had brought her anguish instead of joy.
She did not cry; tears came hard to her, and the storms of her heart spent themselves inwardly. But as she sat there in her dumb woe she felt her life to be too desolate, too ugly and intolerable.
What have I ever done to it, that it should hurt me so?
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“
What have I ever done to it, that it should hurt me so?
” she groaned, and pressed her fists against her lids, which were beginning to swell with weeping.
Chapter IV
A new note in his voice disarmed her: no one had ever spoken to her in that tone.
Show the passage
“Look here—you don’t mean what you said? You don’t really think I’d do anything to hurt you?”
A new note in his voice disarmed her: no one had ever spoken to her in that tone.
“Oh, what did you do it for then?” she wailed. He had her hands in his, and she was feeling the smooth touch that she had imagined the day before on the hillside.
Chapter VII
Whenever she was unhappy she felt herself at bay against a pitiless world, and a kind of animal secretiveness possessed her.
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She walked quickly, straining her eyes to detect anyone who might be coming along the street; and before reaching the Frys’ she crossed over to avoid the light from their window.
Whenever she was unhappy she felt herself at bay against a pitiless world, and a kind of animal secretiveness possessed her.
But the street was empty, and she passed unnoticed through the gate and up the path to the house. Its white front glimmered indistinctly through the trees, showing only one oblong of light on the lower floor.
Chapter VIII
Age seemed to have come down on him as winter comes on the hills after a storm.
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Mr. Royall made no answer. He sat and pondered with sunken head, his veined hands clasped about the arms of his chair.
Age seemed to have come down on him as winter comes on the hills after a storm.
At length he looked up.
Things don’t change at North Dormer: people just get used to them.
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“
Things don’t change at North Dormer: people just get used to them.
”
Chapter X
A longer interval of darkness followed, and then the whole night broke into flower.
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After a while the scattered fireworks ceased.
A longer interval of darkness followed, and then the whole night broke into flower.
From every point of the horizon, gold and silver arches sprang up and crossed each other, sky-orchards broke into blossom, shed their flaming petals and hung their branches with golden fruit;
Chapter XII
She had always thought of love as something confused and furtive, and he made it as bright and open as the summer air.
Show the passage
She had lived all her life among people whose sensibilities seemed to have withered for lack of use; and more wonderful, at first, than Harney’s endearments were the words that were a part of them.
She had always thought of love as something confused and furtive, and he made it as bright and open as the summer air.
On the morrow of the day when she had shown him the way to the deserted house he had packed up and left Creston River for Boston;
The first fall of night after a day of radiance often gave her a sense of hidden menace: it was like looking out over the world as it would be when love had gone from it.
Show the passage
Charity’s heart contracted.
The first fall of night after a day of radiance often gave her a sense of hidden menace: it was like looking out over the world as it would be when love had gone from it.
She wondered if some day she would sit in that same place and watch in vain for her lover. …
She felt like a night-bird suddenly caught and caged.
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Charity nodded her thanks, and sitting down, fell hungrily upon her piece of pie and emptied the glass. Her face burned with her quick flight through the night, and her eyes were dazzled by the twinkle of the kitchen lamp.
She felt like a night-bird suddenly caught and caged.
“He ain’t come back since supper,” Verena said. “He’s down to the Hall.”
Chapter XIII
Believe me, all of you, the best way to help the places we live in is to be glad we live there.
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and after a while—well, ladies and gentlemen, I give you my recipe for what it’s worth; after a while, I believe you’ll be able to say, as I can say today: ‘I’m glad I’m here.’
Believe me, all of you, the best way to help the places we live in is to be glad we live there.
”
Chapter XV
Instead of remaining separate and absolute, she would be compared with other people, and unknown things would be expected of her.
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But she seldom looked ahead; each day was so rich that it absorbed her. … Now her first feeling was that everything would be different, and that she herself would be a different being to Harney.
Instead of remaining separate and absolute, she would be compared with other people, and unknown things would be expected of her.
She was too proud to be afraid, but the freedom of her spirit drooped. …
She was too proud to be afraid, but the freedom of her spirit drooped.
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… Now her first feeling was that everything would be different, and that she herself would be a different being to Harney. Instead of remaining separate and absolute, she would be compared with other people, and unknown things would be expected of her.
She was too proud to be afraid, but the freedom of her spirit drooped.
…
“I hate other people’s clothes—it’s just as if they was there themselves.”
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Charity glared at her unrelentingly. “You’d oughtn’t to have brought it here,” she said, breathing quickly.
“I hate other people’s clothes—it’s just as if they was there themselves.”
The two stared at each other again over this avowal, till Charity brought out, in a gasp of anguish: “Oh, go—go—go—or I’ll hate you too. …”
The nights were cold, with a dry glitter of stars so high up that they seemed smaller and more vivid.
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… flame of the Virginia creeper spread to the hillsides in wider waves of carmine and crimson, the larches glowed like the thin yellow halo about a fire, the maples blazed and smouldered, and the black hemlocks turned to indigo against the incandescence of the forest.
The nights were cold, with a dry glitter of stars so high up that they seemed smaller and more vivid.
Sometimes, as Charity lay sleepless on her bed through the long hours, she felt as though she were bound to those wheeling fires and swinging with them around the great black vault.
She had never known how to adapt herself; she could only break and tear and destroy.
Show the passage
The more she thought of these things the more the sense of fatality weighed on her: she felt the uselessness of struggling against the circumstances.
She had never known how to adapt herself; she could only break and tear and destroy.
The scene with Ally had left her stricken with shame at her own childish savagery. What would Harney have thought if he had witnessed it?
Chapter XVII
Charity felt herself a mere speck in the lonely circle of the sky.
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On that side of the ridge the valleys still lay in wintry shadow; but in the plain beyond the sun was touching village roofs and steeples, and gilding the haze of smoke over far-off invisible towns.
Charity felt herself a mere speck in the lonely circle of the sky.
The events of the last two days seemed to have divided her forever from her short dream of bliss. Even Harney’s image had been blurred by that crushing experience:
Her child was like a load that held her down, and yet like a hand that pulled her to her feet.
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In her fagged and floating mind only one sensation had the weight of reality; it was the bodily burden of her child. But for it she would have felt as rootless as the whiffs of thistledown the wind blew past her.
Her child was like a load that held her down, and yet like a hand that pulled her to her feet.
She said to herself that she must get up and struggle on. …
Come to my age, a man knows the things that matter and the things that don’t; that’s about the only good turn life does us.
Show the passage
“Ain’t it?” He looked at his watch. “Well, I’ll tell you another thing. All I want is to know if you’ll marry me. If there was anything else, I’d tell you so; but there ain’t.
Come to my age, a man knows the things that matter and the things that don’t; that’s about the only good turn life does us.
”
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