Prose comparison Flashcards
Quotes on love and sex
C6: ‘The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering, clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation.
The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace.’
C9: ‘The first few chords…sent a keen tremor down Mrs Pontellier’s spinal column…But the very passions themselves were aroused within her soul, swaying it, lashing it, as the waves daily beat upon her splendid body.’
C11: “This is more than folly,” he blurted out. “I can’t permit you to stay out there all night. You must come in the house instantly.”
C19: ‘…hear again the ripple of the water…A subtle current of desire passed through her body, weakening her hold upon the brushes and making her eyes burn.’
C26: ‘He sometimes talked in a way that astonished her at first and brought the crimson into her face; in a way that pleased her at last, appealing to the animalism that stirred impatiently within her.’
C28: ‘There was a dull pang of regret because it was not the kiss of love which had inflamed her, because it was not love which had held this cup of life to her lips.’
C31: ‘He (Arobin) did not answer, except to continue to caress her. He did not say good night until she had become supple to his gentle, seductive entreaties.’
C35: ‘He (Arobin) had detected the latent sensuality, which unfolded under his delicate sense of her nature’s requirements like a torpid, torrid, sensitive blossom.’
Quotes on love and loss
C15: ‘Edna bit her handkerchief convulsively, striving to hold back and to hide, even from herself as she would have hidden from another, the emotion which was troubling–tearing–her. Her eyes were brimming with tears.
For the first time she recognized the symptoms of infatuation which she had felt incipiently as a child, as a girl in her earliest teens, and later as a young woman’
C15: ‘The idea of Robert starting off in such a sudden and dramatic way’!
C15: ‘Write to me when you get there won’t you Robert?’
C16: ‘Robert’s going away had taken the brightness, the colour, the meaning out of everything.’
C21: ‘Edna was sobbing, just as she had wept one midnight at Grand Isle when strange, new voices awoke in her’
C26: ‘“Does he write to you? Never a line. Does he send you a message? Never a word. It is because he loves you, poor fool, and is trying to forget you, since you are not free to listen to him or to belong to him.”’
C28: ‘There was Robert’s reproach making itself felt by a quicker, fiercer, more overpowering love’
C38: ‘”I love you. Good-by–because I love you.”
Edna grew faint when she read the words.’
C39: ‘She had done all the thinking which was necessary after Robert went away, when she lay awake upon the sofa till morning.’
Quotes on jealousy
C1: ‘What s it? asked Pontellier, looking lazily and amused from one to the other’
C4: ‘She was growing a little stout but it did not seem to detract one iota from the grace of every step, pose, gesture’
C13: ‘Of course not; he knows you are with me’
C18: ‘Edna felt a depressed rather than soothed after leaving them’
C21: ‘”Wrote to YOU?” repeated Edna in amazement, stirring her coffee absently.’
C28: ‘There was Robert’s reproach making itself felt by a quicker, fiercer, more overpowering love’
C30: ‘Her attention was never for a moment withdrawn from him after seating herself at table; and when he turned to Mrs. Merriman, who was prettier and more vivacious than Mrs. Highcamp, she waited with easy indifference for an opportunity to reclaim his attention.’
C33: ‘”It seems to me–do you think his head worth drawing? Is he a friend of Mr. Pontellier’s? You never said you knew him.”’
C34: ‘ A vision–a transcendently seductive vision of a Mexican girl arose before her. She writhed with a jealous pang. She wondered when he would come back. He had not said he would come back. She had been with him, had heard his voice and touched his hand. But some way he had seemed nearer to her off there in Mexico.’
Quotes on guilt
C13: I wonder if Leonce will be uneasy!’ she speculated
C23: ‘In some way you seem to act without a certain reflection which is necessary in life’
C28: ‘There was Robert’s reproach making itself felt by a quicker, fiercer, more overpowering love’
C28: ‘There was her husband’s reproach looking at her from the external things around her with which he had provided for her external existence’
C32: ‘It was with a wrench and bang that Edna left her children’
C34: ‘No; I don’t want to do anything but just be quiet. You go away and amuse yourself. Don’t stay.’
C36:’I love you’ she whispered, ‘only you, no one but you’.
Quotes on truth and lies
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Quotes on proximity and distance
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Quotes on marriage
C1: ‘…and the size of ‘the game’. He did not say this but she understood it, and laughed, nodding good-by to him.’
C2: ‘I see Leonce isn’t coming back’
C3: ‘He thought it very discouraging that his wife, who was the soul object of his existence, evidenced so little interest in things which concerned him’
C3: ‘She could not have told why she was crying. Such experiences as the foregoing were not uncommon in her married life’
C3: ‘Mr Pontellier was the best husband in the world. Mrs Pontellier was forced to admit she knew of none better’
C4: ‘It would have been a difficult matter for Mr Pontellier to define to his satisfaction or anyone else’s wherein his wife failed in her duty toward their children. It was something which he felt rather than perceived…’
C7: ‘The acme of bliss, which would have been marriage with the tragedian, was not for her in this world’
C7: ‘As the devoted wife of a man who worshipped her she felt she would take her place with a certain dignity in the world of reality, closing the portals forever behind her upon the realm of romance and dreams’
C11: ‘She would, through habit, have yeilded to his desire…unthinkingly as we move, sit, stand, go through the daily treadmill of life which has been portioned out to us’
C18: ‘The Ratignolles understood each other perfectly. If ever the fusion of two human beings into one has been accomplished on this sphere it was surely in their union.’
C18: ‘The little glimpse of domestic harmony which had been offered her, gave her no regret, no longing. It was not a condition of life which fitted her, and she could see in it but an appalling and hopeless ennui…colorless existence…she would never have the taste of life’s delirium’
C22: ‘She says a wedding is the most lamentable spectacle on earth’
C25: ‘Her husband seemed to her now like a person whom she had married without love as an excuse.’
C36: ‘“Something put into my head that you cared for me; and I lost my senses. I forgot everything but a wild dream of your some way becoming my wife.”
“Your wife!”
“Religion, loyalty, everything would give way if only you cared.”
“Then you must have forgotten that I was Leonce Pontellier’s wife.”
“Oh! I was demented, dreaming of wild, impossible things, recalling men who had set their wives free, we have heard of such things.”’
C38: ‘She thought of Leonce and the children. They were a part of her life. But they need not have thought they could possess her body and soul’
Quotes on approval and disapproval
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Quotes on familiy
C4: ‘In short, Mrs Pontillier was not a mother woman’
C4: ‘If one of the little Pontellier boys took a tumble whilst at play, he was not apt to rush crying to his mother’s arms for comfort; he would more likely pick himself up…’
C4: ‘Mrs Pontellier’s mind was quite at rest concerning the present material needs of her children’
C23: ‘She was not very warmly or deeply attached to him but they had certain tastes in common.’
C23: ‘…convinced as he was that he had bequeathed to all of his daughters the germs of a masterful capability, which only depended on their own efforts to be directed towards successful achievement.’
C23: ‘…resented the intrusion of the children…to disturb the fixed lines of his countenance’
C23: ‘He kept her busy serving him and ministering to his wants. It amused her to do so. She would not permit a servant or one of the children to do anything for him which she might do herself. ‘
C24: ‘The old madame did not venture to say she was afraid they would be neglected during Leonce’s absence; she hardly ventured to think so’
C38: ‘She thought of Leonce and the children. They were a part of her life. But they need not have thought they could possess her body and soul’
Quotes on infatuation and attraction
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Quotes on reunions
C20: ‘Victor was surprised and delighted to see Mrs. Pontellier, and he made no attempt to conceal either his astonishment or his delight.’
C33: ‘He came and clasped her hand, seemingly without knowing what he was saying or doing.’
C33: ‘A hundred times Edna had pictured Robert’s return, and imagined their first meeting. It was usually at her home, whither he had sought her out at once. She always fancied him expressing or betraying in some way his love for her. And here, the reality was that they sat ten feet apart, she at the window, crushing geranium leaves in her hand and smelling them, he twirling around on the piano stool’
C34: ‘A certain degree of ceremony settled upon them with the announcement of dinner. There was no return to personalities. Robert related incidents of his sojourn in Mexico, and Edna talked of events likely to interest him, which had occurred during his absence.’
C38: ‘The two youngsters stayed dumb with amazement’
C38: ‘The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace’
Quotes on infidelity
C22: ‘The Doctor would have liked to ask, ‘Is there any man in the case?’
C25: ‘Arobin asked permission to enter for a second to light his cigarette…’
C25: ‘She felt somewhat like a woman who in a moment of passion is betrayed into an act of infidelity, and realizes the significance of the act without being wholly awakened from its glamour. The thought was passing vaguely through her mind, “What would he think?”
She did not mean her husband; she was thinking of Robert Lebrun. ‘
C26: ‘…leave in his mind the impression that she had in a susceptible moment yielded to his influence.’
C27: ‘Why do you love him although you ought not to?…‘Why? Because his hair is brown…’
C28: ‘There was her husband’s reproach looking at her from the external things around her which he had provided for her external existence. There was Robert’s reproach making itself felt by a quicker, fiercer, more overpowering love, which had awakened within her toward him.’
C31: ‘He did not say good night until she had become supple to his gentle, seductive entreaties’
C31: ‘Religion, loyalty, everything would give way if only you cared’
Quotes on womanhood
C2: ‘She was rather handsome than beautiful’
C4: ‘She was growing a little stout…’ (about Adele Ratignolle)
C4: ‘Never were hands more exquisite than hers, and it was a joy to look at them when she threaded her needle or adjusted her gold thimble…’ (about Adele Ratignolle)
C17: ‘Nothing I simply felt like going out, and I went out’
C19: ‘It seems to me the utmost folly for a woman at the head of a household, and the mother of children, to spend in an atelier days which would be better employed contriving for the comfort of her family.’
C22: ‘“She’s got some sort of notion in her concerning the eternal rights of women”….”Has she been associating of late with a circle of pseudo-intellectual women - super spiritual beings?”
C22: “She comes of sound old Presbyterian Kentucky stock…and the youngest is something of a vixen”
C22: “Pontellier,” said the Doctor, after a moment’s reflection, “let your wife alone for a while. Don’t bother her, and don’t let her bother you. Woman, my dear friend, is a very peculiar and delicate organism—a sensitive and highly organized woman, such as I know Mrs. Pontellier to be, is especially peculiar. It would require an inspired psychologist to deal successfully with them. And when ordinary fellows like you and me attempt to cope with their idiosyncrasies the result is bungling. Most women are moody and whimsical. This is some passing whim of your wife, due to some cause or causes which you and I needn’t try to fathom. But it will pass happily over, especially if you let her alone.’
C24: ‘You are too lenient, too lenient by far, Leonce’ asserted the Colonel. ‘Authority, coercion is needed. Put your foot down good and hard; the only way to manage a wife. Take my word for it’
C30: ‘the regal woman, the one who rules, who looks on, who stands alone’
C39: ‘She thought of Leonce and the children. They were a part of her life. But they need not have thought that they could possess her, body and soul.’
C39: ‘”Good-by–because I love you.” He did not know; he did not understand. He would never understand.’
Quotes on masculinity
C10: ‘He did not lead the way, however he directed the way…’
C13: ‘Of course not; he knows you are with me’
C18: ‘Mr Ratignolle was one of those men who are called the salt of the earth.’
C19: ‘Mr Pontellier had been a rather courteous husband so long as he met a certain tacit submissiveness in his wife. But her new and unexpected line of conduct completely bewildered him…disregard for her duties as a wife angered him’
C20: ‘…she being a woman and not comprehending such things.’
C20: ‘Victor’s night out’
Quotes on motherhood
C4: ‘Mrs Pontellier was not a mother woman’
C4: ‘It was easy to know them (the mother-women), fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm, real or imaginary threatened their precious brood. They were women who idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as ministering angels. Many of them were delicious in their role…’ - religious imagery
C4: ‘It would have been a difficult matter for Mr Pontellier to define to his satisfaction or anyone else’s wherein his wife failed in her duty toward their children. It was something which he felt rather than perceived…’
C4: ‘If one of the little Pontellier boys took a tumble whilst at play, he was not apt to rush crying to his mother’s arms for comfort; he would more likely pick himself up…’
C4: ‘Mrs Pontellier’s mind was quite at rest concerning the present material needs of her children’
C4: ‘About every 2 years she had a baby…Her condition was in no way apparent and no one would have perceived it but for her persistence in making it the subject of every conversation’ (about Adele Ratignolle)
C32: ‘How glad she was to see the children! She wept for very pleasure when she felt their little arms clasping her; their hard, ruddy cheeks pressed against her own glowing cheeks. She looked into their faces with hungry eyes that could not be satisfied with looking…She lived with them a whole week long, giving them all of herself, and gathering and filling herself with their young existence.’
C33: ‘It was with a wrench and a pang that Edna left her children. She carried away with her the sound of their voices and the touch of their cheeks. All along the journey homeward their presence lingered with her like the memory of a delicious song. But by the time she had regained the city the song no longer echoed in her soul. She was again alone.’
C37: ‘Edna began to feel uneasy. She was seized with a vague dread’
C38: ‘She thought of Leonce and the children. They were a part of her life. But they need not have thought they could possess her body and soul’
