Search advanced search
 
Books
Search:
x dismiss this message

Did you know you can edit this page?

Stones from the River
  • Rated 0 stars
Read Stones from the River
The Burgdorf Cycle: Book 2

Stones from the River (1994) (edit title/settings)

by Ursula Hegi (Author) (edit contributors)

Share this book on:
see page history

Description edit see section history

Stones from the River is a daring, dramatic and complex novel of life in Germany. It is set in Burgdorf, a small fictional German town, between 1915 and 1951. The protagonist is Trudi Montag, a Zwerg -- the German word for dwarf woman. As a dwarf she is set apart, the outsider whose physical... read more

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit

Write a ridiculously simplified synopsis.

Characters/People edit see section history

Show all 44 characters
Popular Covers

Loading covers…

Choose your book’s cover

Quotes edit see section history

  • “Even when he stopped dancing with his wife and opened another bottle of cognac at the opposite side of the room from her, it felt as though the two of them were still touching.”
  • “Praying for something did not make it happen. This was it: there was no God-magic.”
  • “She felt an urgency to know what would happen in her life from now on--every hour, every moment even, because if you knew ahead of time, you could stop bad things from happening”
  • “History was unlike the fairy tales: in fairy tales, there usually was a meaning to what happened and good people triumphed in the end even if they had to suffer; but in history the bullies often triumphed." (112)"In real life, it was not that easy to tell who the villains were, and even if you could identify them, they were not total villains. No one was entirely all of one thing. Cowards could be courageous in some matters, and love was not always declares and might not be pure love, but mixed in with hate and fear and a powerful wish for revenge”
  • “'Have you ever considered that missionaries are arrogant?' Trudi challenged her.'Why so?''Because they set about changing people whose own ways may be far better for them.'”
  • “Your ability to adapt is far more dangerous to you than any of them will ever be. You'll keep adapting and adapting until nothing is left.”
  • “People only hear that part of a story they can handle.”
  • “Given a choice, she would rather be the one who was persecuted than the one who did the persecuting. Both had a terrible price to pay, but she would rather endure humiliation and fear than grow numb to what it was to be human,”
  • “And what she wanted more than anything that moment was for all the differences between people to matter no more--differences in size and race and belief--differences that had become justification for destruction.”
  • Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers
  • “Ah, but we can’t do that—compare our pain. It minimizes what happens to us, distorts it. We need to say, yes, this is what happened to me, and this is what I’ll do with it.”
    Highlighted by 10 Kindle customers
  • they lived in a country where believing had taken the place of knowing.
    Highlighted by 9 Kindle customers
  • What the river was showing her now was that she could flow beyond the brokenness, redeem herself, and fuse once more. If that rock was her love for Hanna, she could let it stop her, block her—or she could acknowledge the rock and have respect for it, alter her course to move around it.
    Highlighted by 7 Kindle customers
  • And throughout all, Trudi wove the assurance for Georg and herself that—once someone had been in your life—you could keep that person there despite the agony of loss, as long as you had faith that you could bring the sum of all your hours together in one shining moment.
    Highlighted by 6 Kindle customers
  • “Fear,” Leo said, “is a strange thing. It strips off masks.… In some people it brings out the lowest instincts, while others become more compassionate. Both have to do with survival. But the choice is ours.”
    Highlighted by 6 Kindle customers
  • Yet the long training in obedience to elders, government, and church made it difficult—even for those who considered the views of the Nazis dishonorable—to give voice to their misgivings. And so they kept hushed, yielding to each new indignity while they waited for the Nazis and their ideas to go away, but with every compliance they relinquished more of themselves, weakening the texture of the community while the power of the Nazis swelled.
    Highlighted by 5 Kindle customers
  • “We Germans have a history of sacrificing everything for one strong leader,” her father had said. “It’s our fear of chaos.”
    Highlighted by 5 Kindle customers
  • It was like that with stories: she could see beneath their surface, know the undercurrents, the whirlpools that could take you down, the hidden clusters of rocks. Stories could blind you, rise around you in a myriad of colors. Every time Trudi took a story and let it stream through her mind from beginning to end, it grew fuller, richer, feeding on her visions of those people the story belonged to until it left its bed like the river she loved. And it was then that she’d have to tell the story to someone.
    Highlighted by 5 Kindle customers
  • given a choice, she would rather be the one who was persecuted than the one who did the persecuting. Both had a terrible price to pay, but she would rather endure humiliation and fear than grow numb to what it was to be human.
    Highlighted by 4 Kindle customers
  • For Trudi, it was amazing to discover how many reasons other than size could turn you into an outsider—your religion, your race, your opinions. Enemies could endanger you with rumors; friends might involuntarily destroy you by repeating something they’d heard you say.
    Highlighted by 4 Kindle customers
Show all 19 quotes from this book

First Sentence edit see section history

AS A CHILD TRUDI MUNTAG THOUGHT EVERYONE KNEW WHAT WENT on inside others.

Series & Lists edit see section history

This is book 2 of 4 in The Burgdorf Cycle. (standard series)

Preceded by Floating in My Mother's Palm, and followed by The Vision of Emma Blau.

This book is in Book Lover's Cook Book, The. (authoritative list)
This is book 5 of 70 in Oprah's Book Club. (authoritative list)

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

  1. Ursula Hegi (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Original Language: English
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Country: USA
Publication Date: 1994
ISBN: 0-671-78075-1
Page Count: 509

Awards edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

  • Library of Congress: PR911.9.H43S76 1994
  • Dewey: 823.20

We’re hiding the errata, movie connections, books that influenced this book, books influenced by this book, books that cite this book and books cited by this book sections. If you would like to add content to them, you must first make them visible.

dineenbecky

You were just viewing this book on dineenbecky’s shelf.

 

© 2006-2013 Shelfari | Terms & Conditions | Privacy Policy | Copyright Policy

Close