“A tiny light had been lit in a cottage on Álftanes; probably someone was going out fishing. Often there was frost and frozen snow, and the ice creaked in the night. Somewhere out in the infinite distance lay the spring, at least in God's mind, like the babies that are not yet conceived in the mother's womb.”
Brekkukotsannáll (The Fish Can Sing) (1957)
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Halldór Laxness 216
Icelandic author 1902–1998Related quotes

Song lyrics, Aerial (2005), A Sea of Honey (Disc 1)

Source: Emir's Education In The Proper Use of Magical Powers (1979), p. 65-66

“Yon foaming flood seems motionless as ice;
Its dizzy turbulence eludes the eye,
Frozen by distance.”
Address to Kilchurn Castle.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Source: Good Will Hunting

“Spring passes
and the birds cry out—tears
in the eyes of fishes”
行く春や
鳥啼き魚の
目は泪
yuku haru ya
tori naki uo no
me wa namida
Matsuo Bashō, Narrow Road to the Interior and other writings, Boston, 2000, p. 4 (Translation: Sam Hamill)
Spring is passing by!
Birds are weeping and the eyes
Of fish fill with tears.
Matsuo Bashō, The Narrow Road to Oku, Tokyo, 1996, p. 23 (Translation: Donald Keene)
The passing of spring—
The birds weep and in the eyes
Of fish there are tears.
Donald Keene, Travelers of a Hundred Ages, New York, 1999, p. 310 (Translation: Donald Keene)
Oku no Hosomichi