Worse Than Death Quotes & Sayings

If you're going to die, die interesting! Is there anything worse than a boring death? (Other than a Charlie Rose marathon on PBS?) I think not. When my time comes I'm going to go out in high style. I have no intention of being sick or lingering or dragging on and on and boring everyone I know. — Joan Rivers

The monsignor called after him, "If I am to blame, then why have I not met the same fate as Brother Mentigo and Brother De Cardina before him? Why am I still alive?"
Calisto glared over his shoulder at the monsignor and growled. "Because there are worse punishments than death. Live with your guilt, old man. May it rot in your heart and kill you slowly for many
years to come. — Lisa Kessler

The grime was no man's grime but death and human locomotives,
all that dress of dust, that veil of darkened railroad skin, that smog of cheek, that eyelid of black mis'ry, that sooty hand or phallus or protuberance of artificial worse-than-dirt - industrial - modern - all that civilization spotting your crazy golden crown
and those blear thoughts of death and dusty loveless eyes and ends and withered roots below, in the home-pile of sand and sawdust, rubber dollar bills, skin of machinery, the guts and innards of the weeping coughing car, the empty lonely tincans with their rusty tongues alack, what more could I name, the smoked ashes of some cock cigar, the cunts of wheelbarrows and the milky breasts of cars, wornout asses out of chairs & sphincters of dynamos - all these
entangled in your mummied roots - and you there standing before me in the sunset, all your glory in your form! — Allen Ginsberg

There were worse things than death, as she'd discovered. Sometimes living took far more courage. Facing another day. Enduring. Those things took strength. Far more than dying. — Maya Banks

This process of surrender - this movement full speed astern - is what Christians call repentance. Now repentance is no fun at all. It is something much harder than merely eating humble pie. It means unlearning all the self-conceit and self-will that we have been training ourselves into for thousands of years. It means killing part of yourself, undergoing a kind of death. In fact, it needs a good man to repent. And here comes the catch. Only a bad person needs to repent: only a good person can repent perfectly. The worse you are the more you need it and the less you can do it. The only person who could do it perfectly would be a perfect person - and he would not need it. Remember, — C.S. Lewis

If he heard her, he gave no indication, just went on about "men who take advantage" and "helpless women" and "fates worse than death." Sophie wasn't positive, but she thought she even heard the phrase "roast beef and pudding". — Julia Quinn

Once supply begins to dwindle, the years to follow will see shortages that at best will cause global recession, possibly worse than the 1930s Great Depression, ... war, famine, pestilence and death. — Kenneth S. Deffeyes

Absence is worse than death. If you suddenly disappeared without a trace, it's like you had never lived. — Vaddey Ratner

In most cases an act of unwelcome sex is no more bother than being vaccinated, so there's no point going on about it as if it werea fate worse than death. With skill and good manners you can avoid having to make the sacrifice, but should you find yourself in a compromising situation largely of your own making, you should stop defending your virtue and start worrying about your maturity. It will give you something to think about while the savage pumper bangs away. — Quentin Crisp

Dreaming's shit, but dying's worse; and watching someone die, that comes somewhere between the two, I guess. It ain't good, but it's got to be better than the other thing, better than doing it yourself. Hasn't it? — Chaz Brenchley

In the old days, people told their kids stories about the big, bad wolf, and men who were especially cruel and horrible were said to be like animals, maybe werewolves. But the things ordinary men do every day are a million times worse than anything a wolf would do. A wolf would never torture another animal to death, or lock it up. They kill out of instinct, in order to survive, because they have to - not because they just feel like it, not because they're evil. Not like us. Man is the scariest animal on the planet, but from the beginning of time, the wolf has gotten the bad rap. We've tried to pretend that evil is out there, lurking inside animals beyond the campfire, and not where it really is, in here.' He [Cody] tapped his chest. — Lisa Tuttle

Redemption through the Cross is worse than damnation, because of the terrible burden it imposes upon humanity, because of the effect it has on the human soul, fettering and paralyzing it with the weight of the burden exacted through the death of Christ. — Emma Goldman

For thousands to do to death a few hundreds is no bravery. It is worse than cowardice. It is unworthy of nationalism, of any religion. — Mahatma Gandhi

Increasingly I felt as if I were entering a struggle that might even be more than life and death. It might be a struggle for my soul, my essence, or whatever part of me might have reference to the eternal. There are worse things than death, I suspected ... so far the word demon had never been spoken among the scientists and doctors who were working with me ... Alone at night I worried about the legendary cunning of demons ... At the very least I was going stark, raving mad. — Whitley Strieber

There is nothing worse than fear. Fear is worse than cancer, fear is worse than torture, fear is worse than betrayal and fear is even worse than death. — Bryant McGill

The only thing that's been a worse flop than the organization of nonviolence has been the organization of violence. — Joan Baez

As she sat alone in the apartment, the enormity of it all started to sink in. Any hope that the North Korean regime might change with the death of Kim Il-sung was quickly dashed. The power had passed to his son. Things weren't going to get any better. She heard her father's words replaying in her ears. "The son is even worse than the father." "Now we're really fucked," she said to herself. Only then did tears of self-pity fill her eyes. — Barbara Demick

Very few old folk are happy, Irina. Most of them are poor, aren't healthy, and have no family. It's the most fragile and difficult stage of life, more so than childhood, because it grows worse day by day, and there is no future other than death. — Isabel Allende

He shook his head, staring at her like a condemned man who beheld the face of his executioner. "Aline," he whispered, "Do you know what hell is?"
"Yes." Her eyes overflowed. "Trying to exist with your heart living somewhere outside your body."
"No. It's knowing that you have so little faith in my love, you would have condemned me to a lifetime of agony." His face contorted suddenly. "To something worse than death. — Lisa Kleypas

Defeat is worse than death because you live with defeat. — Bill Musselman

I told myself that in the country of my birth, from which I was disengaged in an increasingly irreversible way, there undoubtedly were many men and women like him, basically decent people who had dreamed all their lives of the economic, social, cultural, and political progress that would transform Peru into a modern, prosperous, democratic society with opportunities open to all, only to find themselves repeatedly frustrated, and, like Uncle Ataulfo, had reached old age - the very brink of death - bewildered, asking themselves why we were moving backward instead of advancing and were worse off now with more discrimination, inequality, violence, and insecurity than when they were starting out — Edith Grossman

Some part of me ... had been waiting, since Kelp's death, for certainty that God ... was either dead or malicious. On the cot, now, in the rain-shadowed room with the medicine smells, I knew it was worse than that. They were a challenge, a dare: you must look at the horrors of the world and find a way back to faith in spite of what you saw. I had a glimpse of what the purer version of myself might be capable of: enduring the loss, keeping the rage and disgust down, finding meaning through suffering. But it was only a glimpse. There was so much shame, and the shame made me angry at the thought of getting better. — Glen Duncan

Fear of death is worse than dying. — Friedrich Schiller

We can't lose you," she said after a few moments of awkward as hell silence. "You have to understand that we aren't doing this because we don't care about Kat. We're doing this because we love you."
"But I love her," I said without hesitation.
Dee's eyes widened, probably since it was the first time she'd herd me say it out loud, well, about anyone other than my family. I wished I had said it more often, especially to Kat. Funny how that kind of shit always turns out in the end. While you're deep in something, you never say or do what you need to. It's always after the fact, when it's too late that you realize what you've should've said or done/
It couldn't be too late. I knew that. The fact that I was still alive was testament to that. Like Dee said, though, there were worse things than death. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

The minister asks, 'What right have you to hope? It is sacrilegious to you.' But, whether the clergy like it or not, I shall always express my real opinion, and shall always be glad to say to those who mourn: 'There is in death, as I believe, nothing worse than sleep. Hope for as much better as you can.' — Robert Green Ingersoll

You are the true master of death, because the true master does not seek to run away from Death. He accepts that be must die, and understands that there are far, far worse things in the living world than dying. — J.K. Rowling

Many, if not most, Americans can imagine a fate worse than death, and it is a seemingly interminable process of dying. For them, it is frightening that politicians can find ways to interject themselves into this sad process. — John C. Danforth

I just never really thought there could be something worse than death. — Oliver Sykes

I hope it doesn't get worse. But even if it gets worse, I won't regret it. I would rather be dead than live in the factory anymore. Not much difference as they just want you to work to death anyway. And you can't even think there or talk. but I have to think. I have to talk. I have to talk about what I think. — Sigmund Brouwer

Be at peace, my friend. One thing I have learnt about Death is that his bark is worse than his bite. — David Gemmell

Missing Alina was worse than a terminal illness. At least when you were terminal you knew the pain was going to end eventually. But there was no light at the end of my tunnel. Grief was going to devour me, day into night, night into day, and although I might feel like I was dying from it, might even wish I was, I never would. I was going to have to walk around with a hole in my heart forever. I was going to hurt for my sister until the day I died. If you don't know what I mean or you think I'm being melodramatic, then you've never really loved anyone. — Karen Marie Moning

Oh my fadder and I are one, " she said, "just me, just him, and dear, if you are wise you will run, run back to where you came from, run quickly, because to stay will mean worse than your death. No one who dies in Derry really dies. You knew that before; believe it now. — Stephen King

[T]here is nothing worse than doing what you don't want to do, day after day, to little renummeration or applause. It's the death of your soul. — Adam Davies

I see death and tragedy all the time and nothing makes it worse than when it's totally senseless. All she needed was some niceness, some basic human kindness, and she wouldn't be on her way to the morgue and her parents wouldn't be devastated. It's heartbreaking and so senseless. — Jay Crownover

I won't snatch, harm, or scare to death people with you or use checking up on you as an excuse to cause trouble. You're worse than my mother, Rachel."
"Mine, too," Jenks muttered. — Kim Harrison

There are things far worse than death, for when it comes to us it is final. What lies beyond it is a matter of faith in what we had hope for. — R. Alan Woods

But you are not afraid." "There are so many worse things than death," he said. "Not to be loved or not to be able to love: that is worse. And to go down fighting as a Shadowhunter should, there is no dishonor in that. An honorable death - I have always wanted that." A — Cassandra Clare

I've thought about it more than a thousand times. It was a thousand times worse, so I suppressed it, I suppressed it to death. The moment that I heard that Meahri was leaving, I thought the world was ending because at that moment, I was full of regret. I was avoiding, not thinking, and pretending it wasn't what my heart was hoping for earlier. I'm sorry, because I've made Meahri cry so many times. I'll do well. I'll take care of her forever. Tae-sang, this is my first and last request of you. Just this once, forgive me. — Yoon Sang-hyun

Going insane would be worse than dying. At least death is clear and final — Rita Stradling

There is no worse death than the end of hope. — Pelagius

What is life without honor? Degradation is worse than death. — Stonewall Jackson

I want them to play Britney Spears at my funeral. This way I won't feel so bad about being dead, and everyone there will know there is something worse than Death. — Gary Numan

Tyranny in democratic republics does not proceed in the same way, however. It ignores the body and goes straight for the soul. The master no longer says: You will think as I do or die. He says: You are free not to think as I do. You may keep your life, your property, and everything else. But from this day forth you shall be as a stranger among us. You will retain your civic privileges, but they will be of no use to you. For if you seek the votes of your fellow citizens, they will withhold them, and if you seek only their esteem, they will feign to refuse even that. You will remain among men, but you will forfeit your rights to humanity. When you approach your fellow creatures, they will shun you as one who is impure. And even those who believe in your innocence will abandon you, lest they, too, be shunned in turn. Go in peace, I will not take your life, but the life I leave you with is worse than death. — Alexis De Tocqueville

I often took him as one of God's little jokes on me. When I was in desperate trouble, what saved me from a fate worse than death? To what do I owe my life? Was it love, affection, understanding, friends, wisdom? No no no. It was a man who looks like a poor copy of Walt Disney, drives pink Cadillacs, wears baby-blue alligator shoes, and appears to have the emotional depth of a slightly retarded potato. — Mark Vonnegut

Because there was only one thing worse than dying. And that was knowing you were going to die. And where. And how. ("Death Ship") — Richard Matheson

When tragedy comes like this, at first it is complete. You do not need to think it over, or decide what it means. For it is far ahead of you, and the very act of acknowledging it means letting it go. But then it comes round again - and it goes through you and is worse than before. — Benjamin Lytal

I've stabbed a man to death. Had sex with a stranger on camera. My soul was stained black with so many crimes, but I couldn't bear to watch him die. Maybe that made me a coward, worse than Vinny. He had been sadistic. I had been selfish. — Lana Sky

There are fates worse than death. — Maggie Stiefvater

I can't go through you walking out on me again," he said. "I've got skin tougher than a rhinoceros hide, but I've always been a big weakling when it comes to you. If you want back into my life, it has to be for good this time." "For better or for worse, for richer or poorer . . . is that what you mean?" "Till death do us part. Yeah, that's what I'm getting at." Her face was beautiful and shining and confident. "That's what I want too. — Elizabeth Camden

The least-bad scenario is a hard landing, global recession worse than the 1930s. The worst-case borrows from the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: war, famine, pestilence and death. — Kenneth S. Deffeyes

The account in the gospel of John says three times that Jesus was angry. One of the words used is the Greek term for "furious indignation" - the word used by Aeschylus to describe war horses rearing up on their hind legs, snorting through their nostrils, and charging into battle. This was the reaction of Jesus of Nazareth when face to face with a loved one's death. The world that God created good and beautiful and whole was now broken and in ruins. In moments Jesus was going to do something, but his first response was outrage - instinctive, blazing outrage. Clearly, death was even worse in his eyes than in ours. — Os Guinness

And it would be a death of the worst kind; becoming the very thing that I hunted myself, or worse. It was far more terrifying than the end of life completely. I'd rather be gone from this world for all of eternity than become a slave to Hell. — L.J. Kentowski

Right you guessed the rising morrow
And scorned to tread the mire you must:
Dust's your wages, son of sorrow,
But men may come to worse than dust.
Souls undone, undoing others,-
Long time since the tale began.
You would not live to wrong your brothers:
Oh lad, you died as fits a man. — A.E. Housman

Ew writers like other writers' works. The only time they like them is when they are dead or if they have been for a long time. Writers only like to sniff their own turds. I am one of those. I don't even like to talk to writers, look at them or worse, listen to them. And the worst is to drink with them, they slobber all over themselves, really look piteous, look like they are searching for the wing of the mother.
I'd rather think about death than about other writers. Far more pleasant. — Charles Bukowski

There is nothing worse than an idle hour, with no occupation offering. People who have many such hours are simply animals waiting docilely for death. We all come to that state soon or late. It is the curse of senility. — H.L. Mencken

The idea that her death should precede his was worse than intolerable, it was obscene. — Joe Hill

I had never seen a woman in such despair before. It was worse than death, it was a constant longing for death and a constant rejection of life. She lived like darkness in her own day. — Philippa Gregory

That really changed me, when I realized that an excruciating life is worse than an excruciating death. — Jonathan Safran Foer

The important thing, I think, is not to be bitter. You know, if it turns out that there is a God, I don't think that he's evil. I think that the worst thing you could say about him is that basically he's an underachiever. After all, you know, there are worse things in life than death. — Woody Allen

She would never, ever understand the idea that a child, especially an infant, was of more value than an adult who had already gained all the skills needed to benefit the community. The death of potential was somehow worse than a loss of achievement and knowledge was something she had never been able to wrap her brain around. — Becky Chambers

Fear of death is worse than death itself... — Gosho Aoyama

It was my first dead body and I waited for the appropriate feelings. I didn't know what feelings to expect, which was worse than realising that I had none. — John Mole

When he came to fear and detest you, it was worse. He ordered three hits on you that I know of."
Roarke continued to stroll. "There were five, actually."
"Why didn't you ever retaliate?"
"I don't need the blood of my competitors. Or even my enemies. He was, for some years, nothing to me. But he should never have touched my wife. I'd have done him for that, if you're interested. For putting a mark on her."
"You didn't, and he lives."
"Because doing so would've put another mark on her, as that's who she is."
"You let him live to protect your wife?"
Roarke paused, looked Alex in the face. "If you think the lieutenant needs protection, mine or anyone's, you've severely misjudged her. I let him live out of respect to her. And I became convinced living, as he is condemned to live now, was worse than death. — J.D. Robb

Death is, in some ways, unacceptable. It's just an astonishing fact of our being here that we die; but I think worse than that is if we live long enough, we lose everyone we love in this world. I mean people die and disappear, and we're left with this stark mystery: just the sheer not knowing of what happened to them. — Sam Harris

I waved down a lit cab. He swerved dramatically towards me and stopped inches from my Louboutins. Shoe-icide, a fate worse than death — Lindsey Kelk

Death was a release, in so many ways. An end to suffering. An escape to something else. What that something else was, I didn't know. Maybe heaven. Maybe hell. Maybe nothing at all. But I doubted it could be any worse than some of the things I'd seen and done in my lifetime. — Jennifer Estep

Parting is worse than death; it is death of love! — John Dryden

." the Noween bellows with furious force: "Nooo! IT HAS TO BE DONE NOOOW!" The Noween hates children, because children refuse to accept the Noween's lie that time is linear. Children know that time is just an emotion, so "now" is a meaningless word to them, just as it was for Granny. George used to say that Granny wasn't a time-optimist, she was a time-atheist, and the only religion she believed in was Do-It-Later-Buddhism. The Noween brought the fears to the Land-of-Almost-Awake to catch children, because when a Noween gets hold of a child it engulfs the child's future, leaving the victim helpless where it is, facing an entire life of eating now and sleeping now and tidying up right away. Never again can the child postpone something boring till later and do something fun in the meantime. All that's left is now. A fate far worse than death, — Fredrik Backman

Better that we should err in action than wholly refuse to perform. The storm is so much better than the calm, as it declares the presence of a living principle. Stagnation is something worse than death. It is corruption also. — William Gilmore Simms

Officially there are no fates worse than death. Unofficially, there is a profusion of such fates. For some people, just living with the thought that they will die is a fate worse than death itself. — Thomas Ligotti

Ignominy is universally acknowledged to be a worse punishment than death . . . It would seem strange that ignominy should ever have been adopted as a milder punishment than death, did we not know that the human mind seldom arrives at truth up on any subject till it has first reached the extremity of error. - BENJAMIN RUSH, "AN ENQUIRY INTO THE EFFECTS OF PUBLIC PUNISHMENTS UPON CRIMINALS, AND UPON SOCIETY," MARCH 9, 1787 — Jon Ronson

Outside the house is a world where the shelves are stocked, where radio waves are full of music, where young men walk the streets again, men who have deprievation and a fear worse than death, who have willingly given up their early twenties and now, thinking of thirty and beyond, haven't any time to spare. — Michael Cunningham

Like the pro-slavery forces who invaded Kansas, the pro-abortion forces in Washington and elsewhere want us to believe that abortion is not murder; that being born is worse than death; that the unborn baby is property, not a person. — Tim Huelskamp

Abortion is the insurance against that fate worse than death which is called a family. — Peter Kreeft

Death is final. No it is not just final, it's worse than that, it's diminishing: the dead continue to decrease, to occupy less space. — Natascha McElhone

I can't bear the thought of oblivion, Asriel," she continued. "Sooner anything than that. I used to think pain would be worse - to be tortured forever - I thought that must be worse . . . But as long as you were conscious, it would be better, wouldn't it? Better than feeling nothing, just going into the dark, everything going out forever and ever? — Philip Pullman

There are far too many screenwriters who have made themselves honorary "secret" members of the Audience Protection Society (APS). Of course, they're easy to spot, which makes their membership in this group anything but secret. They write as if they are duty bound to protect their readers from the nastiness of ruthless drama. The way they see it, if they're going to go to the trouble of creating loveable and attractive characters why throw them to blood-thirsty apes, or have them face a fate worse than death? They tell themselves that such actions would offend their audience's sensibilities, but really it's their own fears and prejudices they can't cope with, not to mention those nagging insecurities concerning their ability to write credible characters in the grip of extreme emotion. They'd rather be dead than write cheese. — Billy Marshall Stoneking

Terminally ill cancer patients who were put on a mechanical ventilator, given electrical defibrillation or chest compressions, or admitted, near death, to intensive care had a substantially worse quality of life in their last week than those who received no such interventions. And, six months after their death, their caregivers were three times as likely to suffer major depression. — Atul Gawande

You're fucked. You thought you were going to be someone, but now it's obvious you're nobody. You haven't got as much talent as you thought you had, and there was no Plan B, and you got no skills and no education, and now you're looking at forty or fifty years of nothing. Less than nothing, probably. That's pretty heavy. That's worse than having the brain thing, because what you got now will take a lot longer to kill you. You've got the choice of a slow, painful death, or a quick, merciful one. — Nick Hornby

So, what you're basically telling me is death is boring but no worse than hanging out with family. — John Zakour

Death is death, Byron. We're dying, all of us, a little each day. Sometimes all at once in an instant. There are worse thing than dying. — Stephen Donald Huff

They loved him, or loved the thought of him, what they thought he was: a man who could easily have had a good life who chose instead their life: spite and bitterness and age-fogged glasses of watery whiskey in dark, cobwebbed country bars, shit-smeared toilets, blood-streaked piss, and early death. He could have helped it but didn't. They couldn't help it and loved him for being worse than them. He was the king of the wasters. — Donal Ryan

Tam: What begg'st thou then? fond woman, let me go.
Lav: 'Tis present death I beg; and one thing more That womanhood denies my tongue to tell.
O! keep me from their worse than killing lust,
And tumble me into some loathsome pit,
Where never man's eye may behold my body:
Do this, and be a charitable murderer.
Tam: So should I rob my sweet sons of their fee:
No, let them satisfy their lust on thee.
Dem: Away! for thou hast stay'd us here too long.
Lav: No grace! no womanhood! Ah, beastly creature,
The blot and enemy to our general name.
Confusion fall - — William Shakespeare

The physical contact with people who struck and trampled and killed one another seemed far worse to him than a solitary death in the purity of the waters. — Milan Kundera

editor in New York and my mom and dad on the phone. My body is weak and bloated. I'm slowly poisoning myself to death. And it's not like I haven't seen what this shit does to people. The most fucked-up detoxes I've ever seen are the people coming off alcohol. It's worse than heroin, worse than benzos, worse than anything. Alcohol can pickle your brain - leaving you helpless, like a child - infantilized - shitting in your pants - ranting madness - disoriented - angry - terrified. But that's not gonna be me, I mean, it can't be. I may hate myself. I may fantasize about suicide. But I'm way too vain to let myself die an alcoholic death. There's nothing glamorous about alcoholism. You don't go out like Nic Cage in Leaving Las Vegas, with a gorgeous woman riding you till your heart stops. Alcoholism takes you down slow, robbing you of every last bit of dignity on your way — Nic Sheff

There are evils worse than death, — James F. Cooper

Dead and still in the world was worse than dead and in the ground. Dead in the ground at least gave you the hope of heaven. — Ron Rash

Hal frowned. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Uh, live in a tropical paradise for a week and sip fruity drinks with umbrellas in them by the pool? Yeah, Hal," I said, cranking up the sarcasm far past eleven, "that's a fate worse than death. I don't know what I was thinking."
"No," he said, stretching the word out longer than was healthy for it, "I was thinking more like going on a honeymoon without a wife."
I dropped a sock and looked up at him, stung. "Don't rub it in, man. — Cary Attwell

It would be hard to get statistics on violent death
what do you count as murder? When people starve to death because of policies of governments and corporations, is that murder? Nature does a fair amount of murdering itself, which is why this whole notion of dominating nature arose: it was one of those things that seemed a good idea at the time. No one ever believes a cure will prove worse than the disease. And maybe it isn't. An invasion of microbes that destroys a body could also be called murder. All deaths are violent deaths, I suppose. — Marilyn French

The stillest thing in the world is the corpse of someone you loved. A hunk of cold granite seems more alive than a dead human being. You don't expect a stone to move. A person robbed of all motion and cold to the touch is the most alien object in the world. Natural instinct drives us away from the decaying body, and quickly. Yet love compels us forward, to kiss the empty vessel of the soul departed. ...Lesson two: there are many fates worse than death. The most common is surviving the death of a loved one. For the dead, all questions have been answered or made irrelevant. For the survivor, some questions have been rendered unanswerable. — Greg Iles

there are worse things than death or murder." "Like what?" I asked. "Though it's hard to comprehend," he said, "the worst thing is to say to God that you don't need him. Why? Because a dead person can be restored to life by God; a bereaved person can find peace from God; a person who has been violated can find God's sustenance and strength and even see God conquer through the dark mystery of evil. In other words, there is recourse through these atrocities and tragedies. But to a person who says he or she doesn't need God, what is the recourse? There is none. — Lee Strobel

Take care what you say! I'll have no hard words. Wretch! If I am a wretch, who made me one? If I hate you and myself and the world, who made me hate it? I was born free - as free as you are. Why should I be sent to herd with beasts, and condemned to this slavery, worse than death? Tell me that, Maurice Frere - tell me that! — Marcus Clarke

What had Subhash told Bela, to keep her away? Nothing, probably. It was the just punishment for her crime. She understood now what it meant to walk away from her child. It had been her own act of killing. A connection she had severed, resulting in a death that applied only to the two of them. It was a crime worse than anything Udayan had committed. She had never written to Bela. Never dared reach out, to reassure her. What reassurance was hers to give? What she'd done could never be undone. Her silence, her absence, seemed decent in comparison. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Good work does not matter, because a man is judged by his worst output and another man takes all the credit of his best as a rule. Bad work does not matter, because other men do worse, and incompetents hang on longer in India than anywhere else. Amusements do not matter, because you must repeat them as soon as you have accomplished them once, and most amusements only mean trying to win another person's money. Sickness does not matter, because it's all in the day's work, and if you die another man takes over your place and your office in the eight hours between death and burial. — Rudyard Kipling

You shall delve in the darkness of the endless maze," I remembered. "The dead, the traitor, and the lost one raise. We raised a lot of the dead. We saved Ethan Nakamura, who turned out to be a traitor. We raised the spirit of Pan, the lost one." Annabeth shook her head like she wanted me to stop. "You shall rise or fall by the ghost king's hand," I pressed on. "That wasn't Minos, like I'd thought. It was Nico. By choosing to be on our side, he saved us. And the child of Athena's final stand - that was Daedalus." "Percy - " "Destroy with a hero's final breath. That makes sense now. Daedalus died to destroy the Labyrinth. But what was the last - " "And lose a love to worse than death." Annabeth — Rick Riordan

It was like a dam of musical critique had broken. Imasu turned on him with eyes that flashed instead of shining. It is worse than you can possibly imagine! When you play, all of my mother's flowers lose the will to live and expire on the instant. The quinoa has no flavour now. The llamas are migrating because of your music, and llamas are not a migratory animal. The children now believe there is a sickly monster, half horse and half large mournful chicken, that lives in tha lake and calls out to the world to grant it the sweet release of death. — Cassandra Clare

Despair is not for the living
but for those unable to rise and continue;
they are the only souls with a right to it.
It is an end where breath and strength and will
have vanished, leaving no way to persevere.
To sink into the abyss that is despair
is to suffer an existence far worse than death;
therefore, cling to its enemy, our ally - hope.
For life goes on,
and we must not live in despair.
We must not. — Richelle E. Goodrich

A collective insanity seemed to have seized the nation and turned them into something worse than beasts. The princess de Lamballe, Marie Antoinette's intimate friend, was literally torn to pieces; her head, breasts, and pudenda were paraded on pikes before the windows of the Temple, where the royal family was imprisoned, while a man boasted drunkenly at a cafe that he had eaten the princess' heart, which he probably had. — J. Christopher Herold

To me, the thing that is worse than death is betrayal. You see, I could conceive death, but I could not conceive betrayal. — Malcolm X

This is American two-one-three to the cockpit voice recorder. Now we know what it's like. It is worse than we'd ever imagined. They didn't prepare us for this at the death simulator in Denver. Our fear is pure, so totally stripped of distractions and pressures as to be a form of transcendental meditation. In less than three minutes we will touch down, so to speak. They will find our bodies in some smoking field, strewn about in the grisly attitudes of death. I love you, Lance." This time there was a brief pause before the mass wailing recommenced. Lance? — Don DeLillo