327 Quotes by Colum McCann

The days hardened like loaves: he ate them without appetite.

That’s what sons do: write to their mothers about recall, tell themselves about the past until they come to realize that they are the past.

The conspiracy of women. We are in it together, make no mistake.

The essence of intelligence was to know when, or if, to expose even the heart’s deep need for instruction.

Nobody falls halfway.

The air felt suddenly shared. The man above was a word they seemed to know, though they had not heard it before.

She had that emigrant’s sadness – she would never go back to her old country – it was gone in more senses than one – but she was forever gazing homewards anyway.

The smallest moments: they return, dwell, endure.

She had told Jaslyn once that everyone knows where they are from when they know where it is they want to be buried.