“People disappear when they die. Their voice, their laughter, the warmth of their breath. Their flesh. Eventually their bones. All living memory of them ceases. This is both dreadful and natural. Yet for some there is a exception to this annihilation. For in the books they write they continue to exist. We can rediscover them. Their humour, their tone of voice, their moods. Through the written word they can anger you or make you happy. They can comfort you. They can perplex you. All this even though they are dead. Like flies in amber, like corpses frozen in ice, that which according to the laws of nature should pass away is, by the miracle of ink on paper, preserved.”

—Diane Setterfield in ‘The Thirteenth Tale’

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Categories: Quotes

Tags: amber, anger, Arts, bones, book, books, breath, comfort, corpses, death, diane setterfield, Earth Science, flesh, flies, happiness, humour, ice, ink, laughter, laws, memory, miracle, moods, nature, Nonverbal communication, paper, people, perplex, Physical law, Recreation, shopping, voice, warmth, words