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Mrs. Lowe: My son is in pain! Please, stop this!
Dr. Sayer: He's fighting, Mrs. Lowe.
Mrs. Lowe: He's losing.
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Beth: Miriam! I have to take your blood pressure!
Miriam: I've been sitting still for 25 years. You missed your chance.
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Mrs. Lowe: When my son was born healthy, I never asked why. Why was I so lucky? What did I do to deserve this perfect child, this perfect life? But when he got sick, you can bet I asked why! I demanded to know why! Why was this happening?
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Dr. Sayer: I'm sorry, if you were right, I would agree with you.
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Lucy: I can't imagine being older than 22. I've no experience at it. I know it's not 1926. I just need it to be.
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Margaret: Miriam, there's no easy way to tell you this, so - your husband - he was granted a divorce from you in 1952.
Miriam: Oh, thank God!
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Dr. Sayer: You'd think at a certain point all these atypical somethings would amount to a typical something.
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Dr. Sayer: You told him I was a kind man. How kind is it to give life, only to take it away?
Eleanor: It's given to and taken away from all of us.
Dr. Sayer: Why does that not comfort me?
Eleanor: Because you are a kind man. Because he's your friend.
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Leonard Lowe: It's quiet.
Dr. Malcolm Sayer: Yes, everybody's sleeping.
Leonard Lowe: I'm not asleep.
Dr. Malcolm Sayer: [smiles] No. You're awake.
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Dr. Sayer: Where are my glasses?
Eleanor: They're on your face.
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Leonard Lowe: Hello. My name is Leonard Lowe. It has been explained to me that I've been away for quite some time.I'm back.
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Dr. Sayer: What we do know is that, as the chemical window closed, another awakening took place; that the human spirit is more powerful than any drug - and THAT is what needs to be nourished: with work, play, friendship, family. THESE are the things that matter. This is what we'd forgotten - the simplest things.
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Dr. Malcolm Sayer: She borrows the will of the ball.
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Nurse Beth: Dr. Sayer
Dr. Sayer: What is it?
Nurse Beth: It's a fucking miracle
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Paula: [reading to her father] The Mighty Mets stormed their locker room shortly after nine o'clock on their night to remember. Released from bondage and ridicule after seven destitute seasons, they raised the roof of Shea Stadium - while their fans attempted to dismantle it - in one of the loudest, wildest victory celebrations in baseball history
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Dr. Sayer: His gaze is from the passing of bars so exhausted, that it doesn't hold a thing anymore. For him, it's as if there were thousands of bars and behind the thousands of bars no world. The sure stride of lithe, powerful steps, that around the smallest of circles turns, is like a dance of pure energy about a center, in which a great will stands numbed. Only occasionally, without a sound, do the covers of the eyes slide open-. An image rushes in, goes through the tensed silence of the frame- only to vanish, forever, in the heart.
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Anthony: [cheerfully] How's it going?
Frank: How's it going?
Anthony: Yeah, how do you feel?
Frank: Well, my parents are dead. My wife is in an institution. My son has disappeared out west somewhere.
[pause]
Frank: I feel old and I feel swindled, that's how I feel.
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Dr. Sayer: [in job interview] It was an immense project. I was to extract 1 decagram of myelin from 4 tons of earth worms.
Dr. Sullivan: Really!
Dr. Sayer: Yes. I was on the project for 5 years. I was the only one who believed in it. Everyone else said it couldn't be done.
Dr. Kaufman: It can't.
Dr. Sayer: I know that now. I proved it.
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Orderly #1: You see doc, we got MS, Tourette's Syndrome, Parkinson's disease, some of 'em we ain't even got a name for...
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Dr. Peter Ingham: Most died during the acute stage of the illness, during a sleep so deep they couldn't be roused. A sleep that in most cases lasted several months. Those who survived, who awoke, seemed fine, as though nothing had happened. Years went by - five, ten, fifteen - before anyone suspected they were not well... they were not. I began to see them in the early 1930's - old people brought in by their children, young people brought in by their parents - all of them complaining they weren't themselves anymore. They'd grown distant, aloof, anti-social, they daydreamed at the dinner table. I referred them to psychiatrists. Before long they were being referred back to me. They could no longer dress themselves or feed themselves. They could no longer speak in most cases. Families went mad. People who were normal, were now elsewhere.
Dr. Sayer: What's it like to be them? What are they thinking?
Dr. Peter Ingham: They're not. The virus didn't spare the higher faculties.
Dr. Sayer: We know what for a fact?
Dr. Peter Ingham: Yes.
Dr. Sayer: Because?
Dr. Peter Ingham: Because the alternative is unthinkable.
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[last lines]
Dr. Sayer: Let's begin.
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Leonard Lowe: We've got to tell everybody. We've got to remind them. We've got to remind them how good it is.
Dr. Sayer: How good what is, Leonard?
Leonard Lowe: Read the newspaper. What does it say? All bad. It's all bad. People have forgotten what life is all about. They've forgotten what it is to be alive. They need to be reminded. They need to be reminded of what they have and what they can lose. What I feel is the joy of life, the gift of life, the freedom of life, the wonderment of life!
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Dr. Sayer: His vision, from the constantly passing bars, has grown so weary that it cannot hold anything else. It seems to him there are a thousand bars; and behind the bars, no world. As he paces in cramped circles, over and over, the movement of his powerful soft strides is like a ritual dance around a center in which a mighty will stands paralyzed. Only at times, the curtain of the pupils lifts, quietly - . An image enters in, rushes down through the tensed, arrested muscles, plunges into the heart and is gone.
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Mrs. Lowe: Oh, hello boys.
Leonard's Friend #1: Hi, Mrs. Lowe. Can I come up to play today?
Mrs. Lowe: Uh, no. I am sorry. Better not today.
Leonard's Friend #1: Oh, how about tomorrow?
Mrs. Lowe: Well, I am afraid, he won't be well by then either.
Leonard's Friend #1: Will he be well?
Mrs. Lowe: I don't know.
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Leonard Lowe: "I'm all right, and then everything stops, There's no warning, It's like a light switch going off. It happens that fast. Something has to happen to bring me back. A sound or a touch. And then I can move again, I'm okay again. It's not that it feels bad, It's just that it's nothing. I feel nothing, like I'm dead. Nothing. Gets to be like I'm no a person anymore. Just a collection of tics. Not that I mind them necessarily. Sometimes they make life kind of interesting. Though I'm not sure who's in control, me or them. What I do mind is knowing that they shouldn't be there".
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Dr. Sayer: I would like to put the rest of the group on the drug. I realize this might be somewhat expensive.
Dr. Kaufman: When you say "expensive" do you have any idea how much money you're talking about?
Dr. Sayer: Yes, I talked to Ray. I have an estimate, um... The pharmacist says to put all others on the same dosage as Mr. Lowe would be, um, 12,000.
Dr. Kaufman: How much?
Dr. Sayer: $12,000.
Dr. Kaufman: A month?
Dr. Sayer: Yes.
Dr. Kaufman: I can't go before the board with that, doctor.
Dr. Sayer: I was thinking of speaking directly to the patrons.
Dr. Kaufman: The few patrons this hospital has already given what they can.
Dr. Sayer: We'll have to convince them to give more than they're accustomed to giving. Perhaps if they see Mr. Lowe.
Dr. Kaufman: I think you overestimate the effect that Mr. Lowe has on people, doctor. We're talking about money.
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Dr. Sayer: I'm not very good with people. I like them. I wish I could say I had more than a rudimentary understanding of them. Maybe if they were less unpredictable...
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Dr. Sayer: Awkward turtles make weird babies.
Awakenings Quotes
Extended Reading
