...the routine of life goes on, whatever happens, we do the same things, go through the little performance of eating, sleeping, washing. No crisis can break through the crust of habit.
Daphne Du MaurierRead
I am glad it cannot happen twice, the fever of first love. For it is a fever, and a burden, too, whatever the poets may say.
Interpretation
First love is a unique experience that carries both joy and pain, and cannot be replicated.
Daphne Du Maurier reflects on the bittersweet nature of first love, describing it as an intense and overwhelming experience likened to a fever. While it is celebrated in poetry and literature, she acknowledges that it can also bring burdens and challenges, making it a one-time event that is cherished but also relief when it is over.
In practice
During a speech about the challenges of young relationships, I might use this quote to illustrate the intensity of first love.
...the routine of life goes on, whatever happens, we do the same things, go through the little performance of eating, sleeping, washing. No crisis can break through the crust of habit.
here was a silence between them for a moment, and she wondered if all women, when in love, were torn between two impulses, a longing to throw modesty and reserve to the winds and confess everything, and an equal determination to conceal the love forever, to be cool, aloof, utterly detached, to die rather than admit a thing so personal, so intimate.
She had to live in this bright, red gabled house with the nurse until it was time for her to die... I thought how little we know about the feelings of old people. Children we understand, their fears and hopes and make-believe.
We are all ghosts of yesterday, and the phantom of tomorrow awaits us alike in sunshine or in shadow, dimly perceived at times, never entirely lost.
How pleasant,' Dona said, peeling her fruit; 'the rest of us can only run away from time to time, and however much we pretend to be free, we know it is only for a little while - our hands and our feet are tied.
A familiar name on its own, however, does not carry its bearer far unless the talent is there, and the will to work.
I loved you so much once. I did. More than anything in the whole wide world. Imagine that. What a laugh that is now. Can you believe it? We were so intimate once upon a time I can't believe it now. The memory of being that intimate with somebody. We were so intimate I could puke. I can't imagine ever being that intimate with somebody else. I haven't been.
The will of God, to which the law gives expression, is that men should defeat their enemies by loving them.
The important thing is not the object of love, but the emotion itself.
Catelyn wanted to run to him, to kiss his sweet brow, to wrap him in her arms so tightly that he would never come to harm.
He gave her a quick, casual kiss on the cheek first. Then came the hug, and it was the hug that always made Laurel’s heart mush. Serious grip, cheek to the hair, eyes closed, just a little sway. Del’s hugs mattered, she thought, and made him impossible to resist.
Oh, if it be to choose and call thee mine, love, thou art every day my Valentine!
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