Variations on a theme
From the end of Little People, which I just finished:
"I guess that's the difference between romance and real life, Elfland and Humanside. I think they probably have tupperware hearts in Elfland, thin and bendy and impossible to break, and thus not worth having. This side, we have the real thing; we have all the real things good and bad, and it's the fact that they can be lost and bruised and broken that makes them valuable. They have all the looks and the style and the flowering cherry trees, we have grotty streets and lousy weather and love that can't be Araldited back together again if you're cack-handed enough to drop it. They have elves who can edit out the bad and boring bits and live for ever; we've just got little people, living short lives, living every second of them, whether we like it or not."
And from the beginning of Fragile Things, which I just started:
"There are so many fragile things, after all. People break so easily, and so do dreams and hearts."
"I guess that's the difference between romance and real life, Elfland and Humanside. I think they probably have tupperware hearts in Elfland, thin and bendy and impossible to break, and thus not worth having. This side, we have the real thing; we have all the real things good and bad, and it's the fact that they can be lost and bruised and broken that makes them valuable. They have all the looks and the style and the flowering cherry trees, we have grotty streets and lousy weather and love that can't be Araldited back together again if you're cack-handed enough to drop it. They have elves who can edit out the bad and boring bits and live for ever; we've just got little people, living short lives, living every second of them, whether we like it or not."
And from the beginning of Fragile Things, which I just started:
"There are so many fragile things, after all. People break so easily, and so do dreams and hearts."