How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Line). Every time a character talks counts as one line, even if what they say turns into a long monologue. We used Donald M. Allen's translation.
Quote #7
Old Man: "Above all I had hoped/ that together we might lie/ with all our bones together/ with the selfsame skin/ within the same sepulchre/ and that the same worms/ might share our old flesh/ that we might rot together..." (525)
The Old Man launches into a little poem about how he wishes he and his wife could rot together in death. As we discuss in our section on "Isolation," many Existentialists thought we all die alone. The romantic idea of the couples' bodies decaying together seems a bit absurd in this view. Why does it matter if their bodies are together or not? They're dead and won't know the difference anyway.
Quote #8
Old Man: "We will leave some traces, for we are people and not cities."
Old Man and Old Woman: "We will have a street named after us." (533-534)
This line makes us laugh every time we read it. Number one: Why does the old couple seem to think that people leave deeper traces than cities? There are tons of ancient ruins scattered throughout the earth, yet millions upon millions of people have died whom no one remembers at all. Number two: If the memories of specific people did last longer than those of cities, why would you care if they named a street after you? The city would be gone, so there would be no streets. Number three: The whole world appears to be underwater, so there aren't even any streets left. This line seems to be skewering the false comfort many of us take in the thought of being remembered after we die.
Quote #9
Old Man: "Let us be united in time and in eternity, even if we are not together in space, as we were in adversity: let us die at the same moment..." (535)
The Old Man seems to be expressing a view that he and his wife will be united in some kind of afterlife. Many Existentialists believed that there was no such thing as an afterlife, or at least thought there was no real way of knowing. In this light, the Old Man's certainty of reuniting with his wife after death seems absurd.