Why do certain quotations remain etched in memory long after the lines have been read or heard?

The association is attached to an emotion — painful or jubilant. When similar situations recur the lines that created an impact are recalled, linking the past emotional association to the present. Painful or joyous emotional experiences are triggered by words that emulate and express what the heart feels. Lyrics of particular songs act as a balm to ease pain, reignite bliss or act as a conduit to purge pent-up emotions. Likewise, a character in a novel triggers an emotional response in the reader as one who feels a kinship to the character. Connections through language and people are the commonality we seek to belong in an ever-changing world.

Do you connect with any of these lines from literature?

‘I can’t go back to yesterday because I was a different person then’
-Lewis Carrol — Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
‘I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I’ll go to it laughing.’
-Herman Melville –Moby-Dick
‘The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order.’
-Toni Morrison, Beloved
‘Do I dare / Disturb the universe?’
-TS. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
‘People generally see what they look for, and hear what they listen for’
-Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird
‘I have been bent and broken, but — I hope — into a better shape.’
-Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
‘Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.’
-George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four
‘Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise’
– Victor Hugo, Les Miserables

What about the characters in literature that strike a chord with you?

* Catherine Earnshaw from Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights– in her torrid love for and forsaking of Heathcliff
* Hamlet from Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark- caught in the web of the fratricide against his father and his mother’s marriage to the murderer, his uncle.
* Atticus Finch from Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird- a father par excellence- role model extraordinaire.
* Frankenstein’s monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein- abandoned creation seeking love
* Jay Gatsby from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby– he creates exorbitant wealth to impress the girl who has his heart.
* Dorian Gray from Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray- a handsome aristocrat who loses his virtue that his portrait cannot hide.
* Winston Smith from George Orwell’s, Nineteen Eighty-Four– living in hope and rebelling to reclaim his unattainable individuality.
* King Lear from Shakespeare’s King Lear- an aging king who is misguided in dividing his kingdom based on the narcissistic need to hear how much he is loved.

There are countless evocative lines and characters that bring a connection to the moment of greatest need.

What is your favourite literary line? Who is your most endearing literary character?