— The Secret History (1992)
dream me the world; semi-hiatus
iz, xvii, she/her
when people fall in love, they burst into flames
lit meme: ten series or books
I. the secret history by donna tartt
Could it be because it reminds us that we are alive, of our mortality, of our individual souls- which, after all, we are too afraid to surrender but yet make us feel more miserable than any other thing? But isn’t it also pain that often makes us most aware of self? It is a terrible thing to learn as a child that one is a being separate from the world, that no one and no thing hurts along with one’s burned tongues and skinned knees, that one’s aches and pains are all one’s own. Even more terrible, as we grow old, to learn that no person, no matter how beloved, can ever truly understand us. Our own selves make us most unhappy, and that’s why we’re so anxious to lose them, don’t you think?
richardpaphens
“…he’s made himself what he is by sheer strength of will. His aspiration is to be this Platonic creature of pure rationality and that’s why he’s attracted to the Classics, and particularly to the Greeks — all those high, cold ideas of beauty and perfection.”
in many ways she was as cool and competent as henry; tough-minded and solitary in her habits, and in many ways as aloof. out in the country it was not uncommon to discover that she had slipped away, alone, out to the lake, maybe, or down to the cellar, where once i found her sitting in the big marooned sleigh, reading, her fur coat thrown over her knees. things would have been terribly strange and unbalanced without her. She was the Queen who finished out the suit of dark jacks, dark king, and joker
charles, kind and slightly ethereal soul that he was, was something of an enigma but camilla was the real mystery, the safe i could never crack.
Some things are too terrible to grasp at once. Other things—naked, sputtering, indelible in their horror—are too terrible to really grasp ever at all. It is only later, in solitude, in memory that the realization dawns: when the ashes are cold; when the mourners have departed; when one looks around and finds oneself—quite to one’s surprise—in an entirely different world.
for @tywinlcnnister. ♡
COMING SOON: THE SECRET HISTORY (based on the novel by Donna Tartt)
Richard Papen’s life turns upside down when he transfers to an elite Vermont college and gets entangled with a closely knit group of Classics students, hiding secrets, lies, and murder. (x)
character posters ↠ henry winter (the secret history)
“But how,” said Charles, who was close to tears, “how can you possibly justify cold-blooded murder?”
Henry lit a cigarette. “I prefer to think of it,” he had said, “as redistribution of matter.”
LITERATURE SERIES: THE SECRET HISTORY | DONNA TARTT
they all shared a certain coolness, a cruel, mannered charm which was not modern in the least but had the strange cold breath of the ancient world: they were magnificent creatures, such eyes, such hands, such looks; sic oculos, sic ille manus, sic ora ferebat.