What a beautiful corrective lens for the ‘nasty, short and brutish’ view of distant human lives. I did not realise the extent to which I imagine the past as a place full of catastrophe and horror until I read this.

What if instead, or perhaps ‘as well’, it was ‘a chance fairly taken, a sense of happiness in the light of spring’.  And if this is its colour, what is yours, mine, ours, now?

Another benediction to bestow on anyone you like: wish them ‘a sense of happiness in the light of spring’.

‘Don’t imagine the past as a place full of catastrophe and horror.  This is its colour: a chance fairly taken, a sense of happiness in the light of spring.’

See also a quote-rich mosaic review of this magnificent, entrancing book: a love letter to islands and a paean to the sea. 

Source: Adam Nicolson, Sea Room: An Island Life (London: Harper Collins, 2013 (2002)), p. 129

Photo credit: Sophie Sollmann at unsplash.com