#fathers

Doesn't seem quite real. It's not meaningful. I can't quite imagine myself being 73. That's the age my father was! [Laughter.] How can I be his age? It's weird. ↗

— Don DeLillo

#ageing #fathers #robert-mccrum #weirdness #age

I will see my father in every anger. ↗

— Courtney Summers

#fathers #violence #anger

As he grew older, which was mostly in my absence, my firstborn son, Alexander, became ever more humorous and courageous. There came a time, as the confrontation with the enemies of our civilization became more acute, when he sent off various applications to enlist in the armed forces. I didn't want to be involved in this decision either way, especially since I was being regularly taunted for not having 'sent' any of my children to fight in the wars of resistance that I supported. (As if I could 'send' anybody, let alone a grown-up and tough and smart young man: what moral imbeciles the 'anti-war' people have become.) ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#civilisation #courage #enemies #fathers #humour

When he died, I went about like a ragged crow telling strangers, "My father died, my father died." My indiscretion embarrassed me, but I could not help it. Without my father on his Delhi rooftop, why was I here? Without him there, why should I go back? Without that ache between us, what was I made of? ↗

— Kiran Desai

#fathers #identity #loss #death

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. ↗

— Abraham Lincoln

#ago #brought #conceived #continent #created

I have seen him set fire to his wigwam and smooth over the graves of his fathers... clap his hand in silence over his mouth, and take the last look over his fair hunting ground, and turn his face in sadness to the setting sun. ↗

— George Catlin

#face #fair #fathers #fire #graves

We are not called to fight the battles of our fathers with a blind faith. We are called to examine their wars, and moreover, to discern whether their actions were sinful or just. Furthermore, we are called to decide whether to correct the errors of our fathers battles through either peace, war, or some combination of the two. We are not bonded to our fathers' fate, but rather called to build on their trespasses or triumphs for a better future. ↗

— Cristina Marrero

#destiny #fate #fathers #liberty #trespasses

My father was one of those men who sit in a room and you can feel it: the simmer, the sense of some unpredictable force that might, at any moment, break loose, and do something terrible. [Burnside, p. 27] ↗

— John Burnside

#family #fathers #violence #family

Well, Betsy," he said, "your mother tells me that you are going to use Uncle Keith's trunk for a desk. That's fine. You need a desk. I've often noticed how much you like to write. The way you eat up those advertising tablets from the store! I never saw anything like it. I can't understand it though. I never write anything but checks myself. " "Bob!" said Mrs. Ray. "You wrote the most wonderful letters to me before we were married. I still have them, a big bundle of them. Every time I clean house I read them over and cry." "Cry, eh?" said Mr. Ray, grinning. "In spite of what your mother says, Betsy, if you have any talent for writing, it comes from family. Her brother Keith was mighty talented, and maybe you are too. Maybe you're going to be a writer." Betsy was silent, agreeably abashed. "But if you're going to be a writer," he went on, "you've got to read. Good books. Great books. The classics. ↗

— Maud Hart Lovelace

#classics #encouragment #fathers #great-books #mothers

Mothers do not have love affairs. Before their children they have dreams, and after their children they have delusions. If the father is involved somewhere, they have fantasies. ↗

— Bauvard

#family #fathers #funny #humor #love-affairs