His friends told him that nobody was interested in his goddam soul unless it was the priest and he managed to answer that no priest taking orders from no pope was going to tamper with his soul. They told him he didn't have any soul and left for the brothel. He took a long time to believe them because he wanted to believe them. All he wanted was to believe them and get rid of it once and for all, and he saw opportunity here to get rid of it without corruption, to be converted to nothing instead of to evil. The army sent him halfway around the world and forgot him. He was wounded and they remembered him long enough to take the shrapnel out of his chest - they said they took it out but they never showed it to him and he felt it still in there, rusted, and poisoning him - and then they sent him to another desert and forgot him again. He had all the time he could want to study his soul in and assure himself that it was not there. When he was thoroughly convinced, he saw that this was something that he had always known.
Flannery O'Connor
Related Every time they saw him, they recognized him and knew him and expected things of him. And every time... CASSANDRA CLARE And Harry remembered his first nightmarish trip into the forest, the first time he had ever encounte... J.K. ROWLING He said he had accomplished all that he could in those four years, and it was time for him to get ba... BOB MITCHELL Keith had it a little better than most kids here because he had two parents in the same household wh... JEFF HILL He tried to remember Moon Child's eyes, but was no longer able to. He was sure of only one thing: th... MICHAEL ENDE Whenever one speaks of lonely people one takes too much for granted. One thinks people all know what... RAINER MARIA RILKE I like to open for a band as it brings on sort of a challenge and it makes things more interesting. ... KELLY JONES I called him to find out where he got the pamphlet and all he said was it was missing the label, ...... WILLIAM WATSON There were so many different moods and impressions that he wished to express in verse. He felt them ... JAMES JOYCE He came in my office one day and had this sheepish look on his face, like there was something on his... JEFF PYLE Over time, there would be less and less of him and more of the tumor. His brain was being eaten by G... MAX BARRY These people all thought they knew him. They believed he was a whore, and sometimes he thought he wa... BEVERLY L. ANDERSON Once on a yellow piece of paper with green lines he wrote a poem And he called it "Chops"... STEPHEN CHBOSKY He was telling us all that he loved us, and we told him it was OK, he could go to all his friends, a... DONNA JOHNSON (On WWI:) A man of importance had been shot at a place I could not pronounce in Swahili o... BERYL MARKHAM But as the girl timidly accosted him, he gave a convulsive movement and saved his respectabilit... STEPHEN CRANE And Harry saw very clearly as he sat there under the hot sun how people who cared about him had stoo... J.K. ROWLING It was him against the flames and he revelled in it. Logan was good at his job. Exceptionally g... AMY ANDREWS Once there was a boy,” said Jace. Clary interrupted immediately. “A Shadowhunter boy?... CASSANDRA CLARE He used to hide his true self because he feared people wouldn’t like him, or would judge him for b... SCOTT STABILE The marquis de Carabas was not a good man, and he knew himself well enough to be perfectly certain t... NEIL GAIMAN She sucked in a shuddering breath, and he pulled back far enough for them to share breath. Her finge... SARAH J. MAAS It was of the greatest moment, and consequence, that they should believe in him when he came, for th... ELIAS HICKS And if Amsterdam was hell, and if hell was a memory, then he realized that perhaps there was some pu... PAUL AUSTER He felt light, lighter than ever in all his years. He had severed all relationships. It occurred to ... JOSEPH ROTH Vladimir told me he was going to retire and then his representative asked that he be allowed to have... LOU LAMORIELLO And everywhere people asked him why he was walking through the country. Because he loved true t... JOHN STEINBECK His habit of reading isolated him: it became such a need that after being in company for some time h... W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM He told us he met some people from North Carolina and they told him he might could get a scholarship... BARBARA FELTON The park was the heart of the city. He had come to the city – and with a knowing in his blood – ... FLANNERY O'CONNOR With Tay, I was just trying to get a feel for him. He expressed himself candidly where he thought he... FRAN MCCAFFERY He stood in a room, looking around, seeing thousands of himself. He banged the walls made of mirrors... AKSHAY VASU Well, he needed it. He was about to cry, and the next time I saw him he had a smile on his face, so ... LARRY WHEELER You may fancy the Lord had His own power to fall back upon. But that would have been to Him just the... GEORGE MACDONALD I could tell the whole day there was something off about him. When he walked in, he wouldn't take hi... JULIA JACOB I believe that the defibrillator machine saved his life. I saw them shock him three times and then s... BECKY CHITTOM He was beaten (he knew that); but he was not broken. He saw, once for all, that he stood no chance a... JACK LONDON He knew Alec enough by now to know the conflicting impulses that warred in him. He was conscientious... CASSANDRA CLARE He had no faintest conception till that very hour of how they would look, and even doubted their exi... C.S. LEWIS There was no escaping his crown. Or his father, who would behead Sorscha, burn her, and scatter her ... SARAH J. MAAS He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied ... OSCAR WILDE This was important to him, and it tells the history of Colorado for him. He knew the history of his ... BETTIE BACA She'd seen the kindness in him that he hid from the world, and she'd glimpsed some of the pain that ... SHERRILYN KENYON I asked him if it were a mirage, and he said yes. I said it was a dream, and he agreed, But said it ... NEIL GAIMAN There was a man here, lashed himself to a spar as his ship went down, and for seven days and seven n... JEANETTE WINTERSON There was something twisting in his gut that he wanted to deny and couldn't. It was like a knife in ... HAZEL B. WEST He achieved everything he ever wanted, and the cost of that ruined him. It was something he never ca... DAN FUTTERMAN They said they got to him right away, they pulled him out. He just looked over, smiled, that was it.... DAVE ROWE He had just one arm, and there were all kinds of legends that he was fighting a guy and when he coul... JACKIE BERRY As they scuffled in the grass, Adam closed his eyes and leaned his head back. He could nearly scry j... MAGGIE STIEFVATER And Azariah the chief priest, and all the priests, looked upon him, and, behold, he was leprous in h... BIBLE I watched the black ocean in his eyes and saw this flash behind them and understood what he had mean... T.J. KLUNE This love was a torment, and he resented bitterly the subjugation in which it held him; he was a pri... W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM He's for you and wants to help you be the person He created you to be. CRAIG GROESCHEL Frodo drew the Ring out of his pocket again and looked at it. It now appeared plain and smooth, with... J.R.R. TOLKIEN He was astonished at how calm he found he was. Fear of death had always energised him, making him mo... K.J. PARKER Justin always wrestled in the toughest weight class at states. It was great to see him overcome thos... BILL ROYER He was lonely because he could imagine himself as anything but himself and as anywhere but where he ... WENDELL BERRY He was without any comforts of God — no feeling that God loved him — no feeling that God pi... ROBERT MURRAY MCCHEYNE His girlfriend had called him and told him that whenever her ex-boyfriend saw my son, that he was go... JUAN MORALES When he got fired, of course he was shocked. I don't think he was ever given a reason for it. They p... JACK FERGUSON Sometimes, when he looked at me…I felt him. I didn’t know how much of his soul was intact, but h... CHRISTINA L. BARR He was a collector of knives. They pulled him over to see what was in his luggage. They saw that he ... MOHAMMED BABAR You need to fear me, not hate me." I did. I feared him. But I think I hated him more. No,... NASHODA ROSE It had belonged to that idea of the exasperated consciousness of his victim to become a real test fo... HENRY JAMES He was asking all these questions, wanting to know what the deformity was. I asked him why he needed... SUE BAILEY He could have put off surgery a month or two, but I think he put that carrot out there for himself, ... TIM PURPURA When he was in a game, he put his mind, body and soul into trying to win it. He was animated, but th... BILL GRANGER It was once him and her, but she lost him and thought for a long time she wanted him back more then ... AMBER Then I dropped my forehead against his and sat there for a long time, as if I could telegraph a mess... JOHN GROGAN He was so close to having a bad game. He was mad at himself because he felt he wasn't helping his te... BRIAN VOYLES THERE was a man in our town, and he was wondrous rich; He gave away his millions to the colleges... FRANKLIN PIERCE ADAMS Women were glad when he came into their lives. It was not boasting. Women smiled for him; even when ... ROBERT JORDAN They were talking more distantly than if they were strangers who had just met, for if they had been ... W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM Whether or not, he felt very much at home in this state. It was to places like this that they had se... DOUGLAS WOOLF All his life Harry Bosch believed he had a mission. And to carry out that mission he needed to be bu... MICHAEL CONNELLY S., a clever and truthful man, once told me the story of how he ceased to believe. On a hunting expe... LEO TOLSTOY It was terrible, and I even told the police officer when I saw him heading down, I said, 'Where are ... DANNY GARCIA I'm serious, Harry, don't go." But Harry only had one thought in his head, which was to get back in ... J.K. ROWLING There was no meaning in life, and man by living served no end. It was immaterial whether he was born... W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM Guy suddenly wanted to scald his face, gain fifty pounds, shear his hair. He was sick of his beauty,... EDMUND WHITE He did not want to play. He wanted to meet in the real world the unsubstantial image which his soul ... JAMES JOYCE Trent was a complete gentleman and waited patiently for me to speak with him. When he did get his ch... DOUG HOWARD His brother Brandon told him to stop playing with the gun; that's when the gun went off, ... He said... JAMES KENNEDY And they laughed him to scorn. But when he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother... BIBLE They hit him hard, but he doesn't let them get to his head. He takes it, and he's quiet about it. I ... JOE DIAZ …in that moment, as he saw and smelled how irresistible its effect was and how with lightning spee... PATRICK SüSKIND I give [Tomes] a lot of credit. I called him this morning when he was in class and told him he was g... BRUCE MARSHALL He knew all he had to do was beat the guy in front of him. He went out there and wrestled his match. AARON SARRA He ran as he'd never run before, with neither hope nor despair. He ran because the world was divided... KARL MARLANTES She’d fucked him over hardcore. She’d betrayed him and she’d lied to him, and she knew that as... STACIA KANE Boney the snowman, was a crazy, whacked-out guy, with tattooed skin and a goofy grin, and he liked t... MICHAEL THOMAS FORD He wanted to be loved for being just what he was. In this community of Yskalnari there was harmony, ... MICHAEL ENDE And not only of even mainly because of the protection it had given him - it was thanks to his own st... MICHAEL ENDE I told E before the game that I was going to look for him as much as possible. He deserved a game fo... DEVAN DOWNEY There was nothing out of the ordinary. They went to arrest him, he was fighting with them and they p... SHERIFF GARY PAINTER His hands tightened on her shoulders as the truth washed over him. My God, she really had told him y... CAROLYN JEWEL Swallowing, he entered the second code. Then there was a sound like a marble dropping on the floor -... CHRISTINA ENGELA He therefore turned to mankind only with regret. His cathedral was enough for him. It was peopled wi... VICTOR HUGO Once when Monty was in kindergarten, I had read to him and was trying to get him to go to sleep. He ... CHARLES M. SCHULZ
More Flannery O'Connor
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JULIEANNE O'CONNOR Anything is possible with laughter. If you can laugh out loud, especially at a life of mistakes, you... JULIEANNE O'CONNOR You are not for everybody, but you are for somebody. JULIEANNE O'CONNOR They had no previous connection whatever with Connemara; but they saw connections where others who s... JOSEPH O'CONNOR Even a true artist does not always produce art. CARROLL O'CONNOR Sheer flattery got me into the theater. Flattery always works with me, particularly the flattery of ... CARROLL O'CONNOR Nations have come under the control of haters and fools. CARROLL O'CONNOR I have heard show business characterized as a refuge for childlike persons in flight from all things... CARROLL O'CONNOR Conventional show-biz savvy held that Americans hated to be the objects of satire. CARROLL O'CONNOR The reviewer is a singularly detested enemy because he is, unlike the hapless artist, invulnerable. CARROLL O'CONNOR Millions of people thought Archie was a happy hero. CARROLL O'CONNOR It seems that entertainment is what most excites us and what we value above everything else. CARROLL O'CONNOR Some people thought we were presenting Archie as a false character. President Nixon thought we were ... CARROLL O'CONNOR I hate pride, but if I were going to be proud of anything it would have to be something I'd done... CARROLL O'CONNOR Talent can be developed, gift is God-given. But artists have both. CARROLL O'CONNOR My professional life in Hollywood has been filled with joy and laughter. CARROLL O'CONNOR The wages of pedantry is pain. CARROLL O'CONNOR I enjoyed in every way my 12 years of playing Archie, and I wasn't personally sad about finishin... CARROLL O'CONNOR One irreducible residual of 38 years in the business is the number of lasting, loving friendships I ... CARROLL O'CONNOR Not all celebrities are dunces. CARROLL O'CONNOR I do talk less now because the sound of my voice saying over and over the things I said years ago em... CARROLL O'CONNOR Half the pictures directed by men of reputation fail. CARROLL O'CONNOR Both my brothers became physicians and I, of course, wandered into a business where the undiscipline... CARROLL O'CONNOR All in the Family was intellectual; it was art. CARROLL O'CONNOR Vulgar and obscene, the papers run rumors daily about people in show business, tales of wicked ways ... CARROLL O'CONNOR It was a lack of system that made the '30s Depression as inevitable as all others previously suf... CARROLL O'CONNOR In a capitalist society, persons who create capital, like Michael Eisner, are given the staggering r... CARROLL O'CONNOR I'm too diplomatic. I tend to edit my mind before I speak - it can be incredibly draining. ERIN O'CONNOR I have two curiosity cabinets at home filled with finds from jumble sales, markets and my travels. M... ERIN O'CONNOR I am rubbish at the gym. I prefer to exercise by moving around - it doesn't matter whether I am ... ERIN O'CONNOR It's not about hiding your imperfections on a shoot; it's about embracing them and being una... ERIN O'CONNOR I am selective. If I do splash out, it's an investment, and I wear things for years. ERIN O'CONNOR I want to show that we all have the right to be ourselves, and I certainly don't want to freeze ... ERIN O'CONNOR When I was 13 or 14, my parents had a bit of a windfall so bought a lovely new kitchen, but I burnt ... ERIN O'CONNOR I'm utterly androgynous, and I truly love it. It's been part of my identity for so long. I... ERIN O'CONNOR I've enjoyed many camping holidays with my sister and her children, but we're pretty posh ca... ERIN O'CONNOR Caution is the key to safe cycling. I'm aware that cars are bigger than me, but I feel quite saf... ERIN O'CONNOR I'm like a tourist when I'm in London. ERIN O'CONNOR In my work, I'm called to a job at the drop of a hat, so I like a sense of order to my holidays,... ERIN O'CONNOR Cycling is a great way to learn about your city. I love being outdoors, especially in good weather, ... ERIN O'CONNOR A girl must have an indefinable magic, real character, a strong sense of self. Her role is to respon... ERIN O'CONNOR I lead a very busy life and don't have a lot of time, so my skincare needs to be easy and portab... ERIN O'CONNOR It makes me cross when I hear people say, 'It's so last season.' I always say, 'It... ERIN O'CONNOR I've been on both sides: the victim and the villain. I was the victimised model, and everything ... ERIN O'CONNOR Winter is my favourite season. ERIN O'CONNOR My style has been nurtured over time. It's more about knowing what doesn't suit you. I love ... ERIN O'CONNOR My perfect bag would be practical but also have the stylish element to it; it would be bold and colo... ERIN O'CONNOR Life is full of surprises but you are exactly where you are supposed to be. Start there. JULIEANNE O'CONNOR Life's unpredictable path and length, should be enough to make you want to take a chance. JULIEANNE O'CONNOR Do the best you can in every task, no matter how unimportant it may seem at the time. No one learns ... SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR Those who would renegotiate the boundaries between church and state must therefore answer a difficul... SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR What if one thing resonates with everybody, but it's not the same for anybody? MARK ALLEN O'CONNOR Breaking, in modern psychology, 'learned helplessness.' This is where you crush an animal's desire t... REBECCA K. O'CONNOR