Jean Rhys
Jean Rhys
Jean Rhys, CBE, born Ella Gwendolyn Rees Williams, was a mid-20th-century novelist who was born and grew up in the Caribbean island of Dominica, though she was mainly resident in England from the age of 16. She is best known for her novel Wide Sargasso Sea, written as a prequel to Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth24 August 1894
beautiful fire red
Your red dress,’ she said, and laughed. But I looked at the dress on the floor and it was as if the fire had spread across the room. It was beautiful and it reminded me of something I must do. I will remember I thought. I will remember quite soon now.
flower moving sunset
As soon as I turned the key I saw it hanging, the color of fire and sunset. the colour of flamboyant flowers. ‘If you are buried under a flamboyant tree, ‘ I said, ‘your soul is lifted up when it flowers. Everyone wants that.’ She shook her head but she did not move or touch me.
shapes novel
I like shape very much. A novel has to have shape, and life doesn't have any.
golden-days lasts sun
But they never last, the golden days. And it can be sad, the sun in the afternoon, can't it? Yes, it can be sad, the afternoon sun, sad and frightening.
dream book men
I'm no use to anybody,' I say. 'I'm a cérébrale, can't you see that?' Thinking how funny a book would be, called 'Just a Cérébrale or You Can't Stop Me From Dreaming'. Only, of course, to be accepted as authentic, to carry any conviction, it would have to be written by a man. What a pity, what a pity!
light air blue
After all this, what happened? What happened was that, as soon as I had the slightest chance of a place to hide in, I crept into it and hid. Well, sometimes it's a fine day isn't it? Sometimes the skies are blue. Sometimes the air is light, easy to breathe. And there is always tomorrow...
lasts firsts first-time
The last time you were happy about nothing; the first time you were afraid about nothing. Which came first?
kissing kiss-me different
Soon he'll come in again and kiss me, but differently. He'll be different and so I'll be different. It'll be different. I thought, 'It'll be different, different. It must be different.
fear long world
And I saw that all my life I had known that this was going to happen, and that I'd been afraid for a long time, I'd been afraid for a long time. There's fear, of course, with everybody. But now it had grown, it had grown gigantic; it filled me and it filled the whole world.
eye talking knowing
When he talked his eyes went away from mine and then he forced himself to look straight at me and he began to explain and I knew that he felt very strange with me and that he hated me, and it was funny sitting there and talking like that, knowing he hated me.
letting-go fall water
It was like letting go and falling back into water and seeing yourself grinning up through the water, your face like a mask, and seeing the bubbles coming up as if you were trying to speak from under the water. And how do you know what it's like to try to speak from under water when you're drowned?
eye heart my-heart
Something came out from my heart into my throat and then into my eyes.
rooms ghost empty
I am empty of everything. I am empty of everything but the thin, frail ghosts in my room.
weather cold
Cold - cold as truth, cold as life. No, nothing can be as cold as life.