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Doña María
Doña Clara is Doña María’s daughter. In response to her mother’s oppressively intense love, Doña Clara becomes emotionally unresponsive and attempts to distance herself from her mother as much as possible, even marrying a Spanish nobleman just so she can move far away from home. In contrast to her mother’s eccentricity, Doña Clara’s pursuit of conventional respectability and social success makes her pretentious and vapid. It’s only after her mother’s death that Doña Clara’s latent goodness reveals itself through her conversations with the Abbess and her sympathy for the older woman’s charitable works.
Doña Clara / Condesa Clara Quotes in The Bridge of San Luis Rey
The The Bridge of San Luis Rey quotes below are all either spoken by Doña Clara / Condesa Clara or refer to Doña Clara / Condesa Clara. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Part 2: The Marquesa de Montemayor
Quotes
At times, after a day’s frantic resort to such invocations, a revulsion would sweep over her. Nature is deaf. God is indifferent. Nothing in man’s power can alter the course of law. Then on some street-corner she would stop, dizzy with despair, and lean against a wall would long to be taken from a world that had no plan in it.
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She was listening to the new tide of resignation that was rising within her. Perhaps she would learn in time to permit both her daughter and her gods to govern their own affairs.
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Part 5: Perhaps an Intention
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“All, all of us have failed. One wishes to be punished. One is willing to assume all kinds of penance, but do you know, my daughter, that in love—I scarcely dare say it—but in love our very mistakes don’t seem to be able to last long?”
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Doña Clara / Condesa Clara Quotes in The Bridge of San Luis Rey
The The Bridge of San Luis Rey quotes below are all either spoken by Doña Clara / Condesa Clara or refer to Doña Clara / Condesa Clara. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Part 2: The Marquesa de Montemayor
Quotes
At times, after a day’s frantic resort to such invocations, a revulsion would sweep over her. Nature is deaf. God is indifferent. Nothing in man’s power can alter the course of law. Then on some street-corner she would stop, dizzy with despair, and lean against a wall would long to be taken from a world that had no plan in it.
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She was listening to the new tide of resignation that was rising within her. Perhaps she would learn in time to permit both her daughter and her gods to govern their own affairs.
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Part 5: Perhaps an Intention
Quotes
“All, all of us have failed. One wishes to be punished. One is willing to assume all kinds of penance, but do you know, my daughter, that in love—I scarcely dare say it—but in love our very mistakes don’t seem to be able to last long?”
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