At first, there is something you expect of life. Later, there is what life expects of you. By the time you realize these are the same, it can be too late for expectations. What we are being, not what we are to be. They are the same thing.
Shirley HazzardI never had, or wished for, power over you. That isn't true, of course. I wanted the greatest power of all. but not advantage, or authority.
Shirley HazzardDid you ever notice how easy it is to forgive a person any number of faults for one endearing characteristic, for a certain style, or some commitment to life - while someone with many good qualities is insupportable for a single defect if it happens to be a boring one?
Shirley HazzardWhen you realize someone is trying to hurt you, it hurts less." "Unless you love them.
Shirley HazzardGoing to Europe, someone had written, was about as final as going to heaven. A mystical passage to another life, from which no-one returned the same. Those returning in such ships were invincible, for they had managed it and could reflect ever after on Anne Hathaway's Cottage or the Tower of London with a confidence that did generate at Sydney. There was nothing mythic at Sydney; momentous objects, beings and events all occurred abroad or in the elsewhere of books.
Shirley Hazzard