Thursday, April 19, 2012

Making everything ordinary too beautiful to bear

There were phrases of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony that still made Coe cry. He always thought it had to do with the circumstances of the composition itself. He imagined Beethoven deaf and soul-sick, his heart broken, scribbling furiously while Death stood in the doorway, clipping his nails. Still, Coe thought, it might have been living in the country that was making him cry. It was killing him with its silence and loneliness, making everything ordinary too beautiful to bear.

— from "The Man with the Miniature Orchestra," by Dave Algonquin.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

it was darn pretty. thanks for posting.

Anonymous said...

I just finished that episode on Netflix... Something struck me about that quote, spoken over a scene that reflected Pete's despair... I cannot bear the most beautiful things in life. Why is that?