Atonement quotes:
Chapter One:
1. ‘two-day tempest of composition’
2. ‘Briony’s shrine to her controlling demon’
3. ‘Her wish for a harmonious, organised world denied her the recklessness possibilities of
wrongdoing’
4. ‘offered no opportunities to the storyteller: it belonged in the realm of disorder’
Chapter Two:
5. ‘I’d rather read Fielding any day.’ She felt she had said something stupid.’
6. ‘She was being mocked, or being punished…punished for being in a different circle at
Cambridge.’
7. ‘He did not exist, he was banished, and this was also the punishment’
Chapter Three:
8. ‘What strange power did he have over her. Blackmail? Threats?’
9. ‘It was a temptation for her to be magical and dramatic, to regard what she had witnesses as
a tableau mounted for her alone’
10. ‘She may have attributed more deliberation than was feasible to her thirteen-year-old self’
11. ‘reflective child’
12. ‘She need only show separate minds, as alive as her own, struggling with that other minds
were equally alive’
Chapter Four:
13. ‘This would not be the first time she had rescued Briony from self-destruction’
14. ‘There was something comically brooding about his face. His opener was conventionally
dull.’
Chapter Five:
15. ‘The older girl entered so fully into the spirit of her own aloof compliance that she felt
beyond reproach.’
16. ‘Apart from the bedrooms, was the only room they felt they had a right to be in’
17. ‘Then I’ll thank you not to talk about them in front of the children…she had uttered it in blind
faith, like an apprentice mouthing the incantation of a magnus’
18. STRUCTURE: ‘hot across his chest and throat, uncomfortably aroused’ ‘you remind me of
my favourite sister…’ (interrupted by Jackson)
19. ‘Bite it,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve got to bite it.’
Chapter Six:
20. ‘It bore her no malice, this animal, it was indifferent to her misery’
21. ‘Tendrils of worrying disposition out towards her youngest’
22. ‘Shrinking, everything was shrinking’
23. ‘She lay in the dark and knew everything’
24. ‘This wealthy young entrepreneur might not be such a bad sort’
Chapter One:
1. ‘two-day tempest of composition’
2. ‘Briony’s shrine to her controlling demon’
3. ‘Her wish for a harmonious, organised world denied her the recklessness possibilities of
wrongdoing’
4. ‘offered no opportunities to the storyteller: it belonged in the realm of disorder’
Chapter Two:
5. ‘I’d rather read Fielding any day.’ She felt she had said something stupid.’
6. ‘She was being mocked, or being punished…punished for being in a different circle at
Cambridge.’
7. ‘He did not exist, he was banished, and this was also the punishment’
Chapter Three:
8. ‘What strange power did he have over her. Blackmail? Threats?’
9. ‘It was a temptation for her to be magical and dramatic, to regard what she had witnesses as
a tableau mounted for her alone’
10. ‘She may have attributed more deliberation than was feasible to her thirteen-year-old self’
11. ‘reflective child’
12. ‘She need only show separate minds, as alive as her own, struggling with that other minds
were equally alive’
Chapter Four:
13. ‘This would not be the first time she had rescued Briony from self-destruction’
14. ‘There was something comically brooding about his face. His opener was conventionally
dull.’
Chapter Five:
15. ‘The older girl entered so fully into the spirit of her own aloof compliance that she felt
beyond reproach.’
16. ‘Apart from the bedrooms, was the only room they felt they had a right to be in’
17. ‘Then I’ll thank you not to talk about them in front of the children…she had uttered it in blind
faith, like an apprentice mouthing the incantation of a magnus’
18. STRUCTURE: ‘hot across his chest and throat, uncomfortably aroused’ ‘you remind me of
my favourite sister…’ (interrupted by Jackson)
19. ‘Bite it,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve got to bite it.’
Chapter Six:
20. ‘It bore her no malice, this animal, it was indifferent to her misery’
21. ‘Tendrils of worrying disposition out towards her youngest’
22. ‘Shrinking, everything was shrinking’
23. ‘She lay in the dark and knew everything’
24. ‘This wealthy young entrepreneur might not be such a bad sort’