In the Time of the Butterflies Sacrifice Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #1

"But Minerva, your own child—" I began and then I saw it did hurt her to make this sacrifice she was convinced she needed to make. (2.8.60)

Patria asks her sister to take her son, Manolito, because she is going to be traveling a lot for her revolutionary activities. Patria, ever the mother, at first doesn't understand how anyone could give up their child; but she realizes that it isn't that her sister doesn't care. It's that she's making an enormous sacrifice for what she believes in.

Quote #2

She looked at me a long moment, and very simply, she said, "I know you want to stay out of trouble, and I respect that."

"If there should come a time—" I said.

"There will," she said. (2.8.65-67)

Minerva is making a sacrifice by giving up her son to her sister; Patria isn't ready to do so, but expresses her support for her sister's movement. The ominous words "There will" is foreshadowing. It lets the reader know that things are intense and that they are only going to require even more sacrifice from the characters

Quote #3

If you were caught harboring any enemies of the regime even if you yourself were not involved in their schemes, you would be jailed, and everything you owned would become the property of the government.

His land! Worked by his father and grandfather and great-grandfather before him. (2.8.145-146)

Pedrito doesn't want to allow the revolutionaries to meet on his property because of the new law that would take away his land, which is his life, if he were caught. But he makes the sacrifice, which puts his entire family history and heritage on the line, because of his love for his wife and son and his beliefs.