How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
In the girls' eyes I was... old, merely old. Not behaving the way an old man should—invisible, silent, and scared—was, itself, sufficient provocation. (4.1.214)
Cavendish does not live in a culture that reveres the elderly. If anything, it reviles them. Not counting your relatives, how do you feel about old people? And how do you define "old"?
Quote #2
The Undead of Aurora House watched me through the wall of glass. (4.1.271)
Cavendish never has anything nice to say about the old folks of Aurora House. Their Undead qualities either have to do with the catatonic complacency of old age or with being medicated into such a state.
Quote #3
You will not apply for membership, but the tribe of the elderly will claim you. [...] Only babies, cats, and drug addicts will acknowledge your existence. So do not fritter away your days. (4.1.306)
Some cultures revere the elderly. In Timothy Cavendish's culture (England, around the year 2000), old age is a curse, an affliction, a threat, a punishment. How does your culture view the elderly?
Quote #4
[In the past] elderly purebloods waited to die in prisons for the senile: no fixed-term life spans, no euthanasium. (5.1.372)
To Sonmi, it comes as a shock to realize that people just had to grow old and stay alive, no matter how helpless they were, until they died. Euthanasia is considered dying with dignity. The concept of a fixed-term life span is a little horrifying, though. What would you do if you knew you only had so many years to live?
Quote #5
Livin' to fifty ain't wondersome, nay, livin' to fifty is eerie an' ain't nat'ral. (6.1.68)
In Zachry's time, living to fifty is probably certain death. His people live a primitive lifestyle, having to hunt for food and run from predators. Living to be that old would make someone a liability.
Quote #6
Bein' young ain't easy 'cos ev'rythin' you're puzzlin'n'anxin' you're puzzlin'n'anxin' it for the first time. (6.1.129)
With age comes wisdom. Perhaps people today are smarter than ever because of all the knowledge being passed down from those who lived before us. Maybe we should be listening to them?
Quote #7
"We—by whom I mean anyone over sixty—commit two offenses just by existing. One is Lack of Velocity. [...] Our second offense is being Everyman's memento mori. The world can only get comfy in shiny-eyed denial if we are out of sight." (8.1.40)
Timothy Cavendish's story is set up to make us all feel guilty about getting mad at the really slow elderly driver who's had his left-turn signal on for the last ten miles.
Quote #8
"Whey else do they spout that 'You're only as old as you feel!' claptrap? Really, who are they hoping to fool? Not us—themselves!" (8.1.42)
Do you agree with Veronica here? Do you get to a certain point where you feel your age, no matter what age you want to feel like?
Quote #9
It is attitude, not years, that condemns one to the ranks of the Undead. [...] In the domain of the young there dwells many an Undead soul. They rush about so, their inner putrefactions is concealed for a few decades, that is all. (8.1.326)
Some people are old, wise souls, and some people are just old fogeys in young bodies. They will be the ones who give up living years before they actually die.
Quote #10
Would rather be music than be a mass of tubes squeezing semisolids around itself for a few decades before becoming so dribblesome it'll no longer function. (10.8.9)
In other words, Frobisher doesn't want to be the type of old person despised by Timothy Cavendish in Aurora House. We have a feeling he'd be a cool old person, though, like a male Judi Dench. As we learned from the quote above, it's all about attitude.