The Most Important Quotes From The Baron In The Trees

The Baron in the Trees- Quotes and themes to note:

Time Stamps:
1. June 15th 1767 Cosimo climbs tree- sits among family for the last time. (Page 1)
a. Cosimo 12, Biago 8:

Presence of Biago (Narrator):
“I learned this trick too (of climbing trees), for I copied all he did, except that I, ever more careful and timid, jumped off halfway down, or slid the rest bit by bit, with constant little brakes.” (Page 8)

“…so that his leaving us was also partly a protest against me for letting him down; but I was only eight years old, and then how can I compare my own strength of will, particularly as a child, to the superhuman tenacity which my brother showed throughout his life?” (Page 12)

(on mother and her flags) “This slightly annoyed me as I

did not know that our mother had those flags and knew how to manage them, and I thought how lovely it would have been if she had taught us to play at flag-signaling before, when we were both small; but our mother never played and now it was too late.” (Page 39)

“I yearned to follow him- above all…” (Page 40)

“The phrase which was always being repeated around me- ‘One rebel in a family is enough’- made sense and left a mark on me my whole life. (Page 73)

“The story I am about to tell was narrated to me by Cosimo in a number of different versions; I am keeping to the one which had the most details and was also the most logical.” (Page 110)

Narrator travels, “I also went to Paris, just in time to see the triumphant reception of Voltaire…” (Page 143)

“I, in truth, did no more than keep my nose inside our gates, above all to avoid giving the other nobles a chance to say I was in agreement with the Antichrist of a brother of mine, reputed the worst agitator and Jacobin in the whole area.” (Page 196)

“Me, what with being my brother’s brother and our always having been nobles of little account, they left in peace. Later on, in fact, they came to consider me as a patriot too (so that, at the next change, I was in trouble myself.)” (Page 204)

Pages 198-204, pages 213-217 (End of book)

Future Telling/ How does this build tension?:
“We clambered about the trees (those innocent games come back to me now as a first initiation, an omen; but who could even have thought it then?)” (Page 7)

“’I’ll never come down again!’ And he kept his word.” (Page 13)

“… what I am about to tell- as also much else in this account of his life- he described to me afterwards, or I have put together from a few scattered hints and guesses.” (Page 15)

Sinforosa- “She was constantly changing tone, this girl, putting my brother out every time.” (Page 19)

“It was the first time I heard him announce this rule of his.” (Page 24) – rule is that Cosimo wont touch the ground.

“It was the first of the of the fur caps which we were to see him wear his whole life through.” (Page 53)

“Understanding the character of Enea Silvio Carrega was a help to Cosimo; it made him understand a lot about loneliness. Which was to be of use to him later in life. I should say that he always carried with him the strange image of the Cavalier, as a warning of what can happen to a man who separates his own fates from others, and he managed never to be like him.” (Page 85)

“The first attempt at arson and the attack on his life should have warned Cosimo to keep clear of the wood.” (Page 105)

“Cosimo did not yet know love, and what is any experience without that?” (Page 123)

“For Cosimo, now began the best period of his life, and for her too, who would go galloping over the country on her white horse and when she caught sight of the Baron between the branches and sky would dismount, climb up the slanting tree and branches, on which she soon became almost as expert as he and could reach him anywhere.” (Page 160)

Peter Pan/ Viola as Wendy: “Her dress was blue, the horn gilt and hanging on her neck by a chain. The boys had all stopped together and were chewing, at plums or fingers or scabs on their hands and arms, or corners of sacking.” (Page 41)

Robin Hood: “But then he remembered his collier friends starving in the woods with their families.” (114)

Mention of Fairy Tales: “Fairy tales. I’m not coming down to the ground because I don’t want to.” (Page 21)

Conservation theme/ Politics:
“It was after the arrival of the French that people began chopping down trees as if they were grass which is scythed every year and grows again.” (Page 28)

“The oaks then were thicker then they seem to be today, for they were the first, most valuable victims.” (Page 29)

“And if while in a careless and yielding mood he accepted without resistance any new or libertarian idea, such as the equality of all men before the law, or the honesty of primitive people, or the bad influence of superstitions, he would be assailed a quarter of an hour later but an excess of austerity and absolutism, and attack with all his need for coherence and moral severity the ideas he had accepted so lightly just before.” (Page 100)

“His only thought was that the vast kingdom of paths and retreats which were his alone might be destroyed, and that was his only terror.” (Page 104) – relating to fire.

“What he had in mind was an idea for a universal society…” (Page 191)

“’I too,’ replied Cosimo, “have lived many years for ideals which I would never be able to explain to myself; but I do something entirely good, I live on trees. (Page 213)

Interesting mention of trees: “But at heart they were still living in the times of the Wars of Succession, she with her artillery, he with his genealogical trees…” (Page

7)

Cosimo as not human: “They (fruit stealers) ran like human beings, with their feet on the ground. On the branches only my brother remained.” (Page 33)

Borges-like:

(Calvino and Borges)

“Be careful son, there’s Someone who can piss on us all.” (Page 60)

“Now it was he who would go and look for the Abbe Fauchelefleur to give him lessons, to explain Tacitus or Ovid and the celestial bodies and laws of chemistry.” (Page 98)

“… or from regret at the omnipresence of Evil…” (Page 99) Capitalization of Evil.

(Also Invisible Cities and Labyrinths…)

Other things of note: The stylistic difference between first and section half.