95 Quotes by Michelle Paver

And yet I think I now understand the impulse which drives men to shoot bears. It isn’t for the pelt or the meat or the sport – or not only those things. I think they need to do it. They need to kill that great Arctic totem to give them some sense of control over the wilderness – even if that is only an illusion.

This was the wrong way because – because it wasn’t the right way.

Men like that – when they know they won’t be found out – they will do anything.

Never been so intensely watched by a creature who would kill me if it got the chance. I stared at it, and I felt death staring back. A.

Fear of the dark. Until I came here, I thought that was for children; that you grew out of it. But it never really goes away. It’s always there underneath. The oldest fear of all. What’s at the back of the cave? Eriksson was right. One mustn’t think too much. Keep busy, walk every day, that’s what he said. I’ve got to follow that to the letter. Especially the walks.

Fear of the dark. Until I came here, I thought that was for children; that you grew out of it. But it never really goes away. It’s always there underneath. The oldest fear of all.

DEATH freezes everything. Whatever you did or didn’t do, whatever you said or left unsaid: none of that is ever going to change. You have no more chances to say sorry or make things right. No more chances for anything except regret.

If it can be described, it can be understood. If it can be understood, it need not be feared.

Yesterday, I was in Hatchards, and I saw a photograph of it, the usual view from Darjeeling. Everything flooded back. The cold. The silence. The dread. It was so overwhelming that I staggered outside and vomited in the gutter. People thought I was drunk.