Quotes from book

Cider with Rosie

“Our village was clearly no pagan paradise, neither were we conscious of showing tolerance.  It was just the way of it.  We certainly committed our share of statutory crime. Manslaughter, arson, robbery, rape cropped up regularly throughout the years.  Quiet incest flourished where the roads were bad; some found their comfort in beasts; and there were the usual friendships between men and boys who walked the fields like lovers.”

“…. and Rosie, having baptized me with her cidrous kisses, married a soldier and I lost her for ever.”

“The last days of my childhood were also the last days of the village.  I belonged to that generation which saw, by chance, the end of a thousand years' life.”

“The rabble closed in; I was encircled; grit flew in my face like shrapnel.  Tall girls with frizzled hair, and huge boys with sharp elbows, began to prod me with hideous interest.  They plucked at my scarves, spun me round like a top, screwed my nose and stole my potato.”

“She [Lee’s mother] was muddled and mischievous as a chimney-jackdaw, she made her nest of rags and jewels, was happy in the sunlight, squawked loudly at danger, pried and was insatiably curious, forgot when to eat or ate all day, and sang when sunsets were red.  She lived the easy laws of the hedgerow, loved the world and made no plans, had a quick holy eye for natural wonders and couldn’t have kept a neat house for her life.”

“They [Lee’s uncles] were the horsemen and brawlers of another age, and their lives spoke its long farewell.  Spoke too, of campaigns on desert marches, of Kruger’s cannon and Flanders mud; of a world that still moved at the same pace as Caesar’s and of that Empire greater than his – through which they had fought, sharp-eyed and anonymous, and seen the first outposts crumble….”

“This tiny, white-washed Infants’ room was a brief but cosy anarchy.  In that short time allowed us we played and wept, broke things, fell asleep, cheeked the teacher, discovered the things we could do to each other, and exhaled our last guiltless days.”