Because by now Elinor had understood this, too: A longing for books was nothing compared with what you could feel for human beings. The books told you about that feeling. The books spoke of love, and it was wonderful to listen to them, but they were no substitute for love itself. They couldn't kiss her like Meggie, they couldn't hug her like Resa, they couldn't laugh like Mortimer. Poor books, poor Elinor.
Cornelia FunkeAnd I always read the English translation and always have conversations with my translator, for example about the names. I always have to approve it.
Cornelia FunkeLet's run away to Venice, and hide out in an old movie theater. We can dye our hair blonde, so no one will ever find us!
Cornelia FunkeHer curiosity was too much for her. She felt almost as if she could hear the books whispering on the other side of the half-open door. They were promising her a thousand unknown stories, a thousand doors into worlds she had never seen before.
Cornelia FunkeYou know a great many things in dreams, often despite the evidence of your eyes. You just know them.
Cornelia FunkeBlue as the evening sky, blue as cranesbill flowers, blue as the lips of drowned men and the heart of a blaze burning with too hot a flame. Yes, sometimes it was hot in this world, too. Hot and cold, light and dark, terrible and beautiful, it was everything all at once. It wasn't true that you felt nothing in the land of Death. You felt and heard and smelled and saw, but your heart remained strangely calm, as if it were resting before the dance began again. Peace. Was that the word?
Cornelia Funke