How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Everything in the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. (1.1)
Okay, so we start off positively enough: if molecules can say yes to each other and connect together to make life, why shouldn't we?
Quote #2
But before prehistory there was the prehistory of prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I do not know why, but I do know that the universe never began. (1.1)
Whew. This is setting us up for a Major Story—it's not just going to be some little insignificant tale about a poor girl in a slum but a story that might actually help us understand something about the nature of the universe. That is, if we can even understand what this guy is saying.
Quote #3
How does one start at the beginning, if things happen before they actually happen? If before the pre-prehistory there already existed apocalyptic monsters? If this history does not exist, it will come to exist. (1.3)
If Macabéa represents all the poor, hungry, sick people in the world, it's hard to say that there's a "beginning" to this story at all. After all, is there a beginning to poverty? Or is it the result of complex economic, political, and social forces that are so tangled it's not even possible to trace their origins?
Quote #4
As for the girl, she exists in an impersonal limbo, untouched by what is worst or best. She merely exists, inhaling and exhaling, inhaling and exhaling. Why should there be anything more? (3.47)
Gee, maybe because that sounds like a pretty miserable existence? And it is. But the thing is, if you just don't think about it, you won't feel miserable. Hm. We're not sold.
Quote #5
The only thing she desired was to live. She could not explain, for she did not probe her situation. Perhaps she felt there was some glory in living. (3.58)
Glorious? Or just sad? It's tempting to put our own feelings onto Macabéa, but maybe we should really just take her at face value: she's happy. We might not be happy in a similar situation, but, well, we're not her. She is. (Deep, right?)
Quote #6
Before being born was she an idea? Before being born was she dead? And after being born was she about to die? (3.58)
These questions bring up the idea of destiny versus free will. Is there anything Macabéa could've have done to improve her lot in life, or was she simply destined for a hard, sad life?
Quote #7
Life is like that: you press a button and life lights up. Except that the girl didn't know which button to press. (3.65)
Okay, let's play with this analogy: life is like a space elevator—but you have to know where you're headed first. Maybe Macabéa didn't know which button to press, or maybe she didn't even know that the buttons existed at all. And if you don't even know you're in an elevator, why would you expect it to move.
Quote #8
She feared that she would incur some terrible punishment and even be sentenced to death if she began to experience pleasure. So she shielded herself from death by living below par, by consuming her life sparingly so that it shouldn't come to an abrupt ending. (3.75)
Macabéa's fear of pleasure (any kind of pleasure) drives her to purposely live her life too cautiously and prudently. But again the narrator wants us to ask if Macabéa is really unhappy, or if she just lives a life that looks unhappy to us.
Quote #9
But I am fully conscious of her presence: though I utter my cry of horror to existence. To this existence I love so dearly. (3.78)
Notice how the narrator uses the third person, "her" (Macabéa) when he utters his cry of horror to existence, but then he switches to the first person "I" when he says he loves his own personal existence. So maybe it's just her own personal existence that stinks so much?
Quote #10
Will I be condemned to death for discussing a life that contains, like the lives of all of us, an inviolable secret? I am desperately trying to discover in the girl's existence at least one bright topaz. (3.103)
Here's a mysterious and beautiful gem (ha, ha) of a quote. The narrator wants to find some shining gem in Macabéa's dark existence, and it seems like he finds it right before she dies, when she vomits her pointed star—her inner, inviolable light.