Quotes
Love loves to love love.
p. 327
Remarkable what a fragile flower romance is. A gun with a nervous operator behind it can spoil the whole thing.
“Were I to use the wits the good Spirits gave me,” he said, “then I would say this lady can not exist — for what sane man would hold a dream to be reality. Yet rather would I not be sane and lend belief to charmed, enchanted eyes.”
“At least try to see my motives. Granted that I was foolish—criminally foolish—can’t you understand? Can’t you try not to hate me?”
She said softly, “I have tried not to love you and, as you see, I have failed.”
p. 163
It was very pleasant to be loved, but it had its disadvantages if one stopped to look beyond the immediate moment. For a fleeting instant Yradne wondered if she had been fair to Jon, to Brant—even to herself. One day the decision would have to be made; it could not be postponed forever. Yet she could not for the life of her decide which of the boys she liked the better; and she did not know if she loved either.
No one had ever told her, and she had not yet discovered, that when one has to ask “Am I really in love?” the answer is always “No”.
p. 282
It was good to be alive; it was better to be young; it was best of all to be in love.
p. 284
Above all, there was the memory - and mystery - of Helena... It had begun as a casual affair, in the early days of his astrotraining, but had become more and more serious as the years went by. Just before he had left for Jupiter, they had planned to make it permanent when he returned. And if he did not, Helena wished to have his child. He still recalled the blend of solemnity and hilarity with which they had made the necessary arrangements...
The person one loves never really exists, but is a projection focused through the lens of the mind onto whatever screen it fits with least distortion.
p. 269
Whatever godlike powers and principalities lurked beyond the stars, Poole reminded himself, for ordinary humans only two things were important - Love and Death. p. 87
There still remained, for all men to share, the linked worlds of love and art. Linked, because love without art is merely the slaking of desire, and art cannot be enjoyed unless it is approached with love.
p. 37
To the loves of my life: Laura, Barbara, and Jenna
For a man filled with a great, true and unselfish love, even if it be on one side only, there open horizons and possibilities and paths which are closed and unknown to so many clever, ambitious and selfish men.
