# Ever cry at a passage in a novel or short story? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 24, 2008, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262 "2008-11-24T16:26:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2011, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/121 "2011-08-20T18:39:36Z")
> [@Euryphaessa](#): > > I’m definitely a weeper. I bawled during Order of the Phoenix … The bit in St. Mungo’s with Neville’s parents tore me right up. ---
**Author:** ![Taomist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Taomist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taomist)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2011, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/122 "2011-08-20T22:14:52Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Well, it’s a play rather than a novel or short story, but I never cry when I see it performed, only when it read it. The last scene of Cyrano de Bergerac when > > Roxanne realizes that she’s only loved one man in her life, and she’s lost him … twice. > > Or much earlier when > > Roxanne tells Cyrano that she has fallen in love with a man who is gallant, brave, and … handsome. At great cost to his feelings he manages to dissemble his bitter disappointment. Then she asks him about a fantastic swordfight he had the previous night, and when he has finished telling the story she exclaims about his enormous courage. Under his breath he says “I have done better, since.” > > Roddy Yep. Haven’t watched it in a while\*; time to break out the tissues! \*I love the Depardieu film version of this. ---
**Author:** ![Taomist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Taomist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taomist)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2011, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/123 "2011-08-20T22:24:48Z")
As far as books go, I bawl all the time. I can’t think of anything off the top of my head that would be recognizable to most folks, but there’s a series by Robin Hobb that I adore. The fourth book in the 6-part series has a scene that slays me every time. [spoiler]Fitz is a man, and Nighteyes is the wolf he has bonded with. They have been together for several books, for many years, have grown and learned together, are slightly aging now, and their connection has been explored from both sides, extensively. After a battle in which both have been injured, they fall asleep together, and Fitz dreams he is running with Nighteyes, as he often has. Nighteyes is playful and bounding around, Fitz is still tired after the injury and asks Nighteyes to wait up. Nighteyes playfully runs off, exclaiming something along the lines of ‘Never! I was always the one to go ahead’. Fitz wakes to find Nighteyes has died, and the dream was his last communication with his wolf partner. I am tearing up already just trying to type this, haha. What made it hit especially hard the first time I read it was that I didn’t get it until several sentences after it should have been obvious what was happening. Dang, need tissue now.[/spoiler] ---
**Author:** ![Archergal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Archergal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Archergal)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2011, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/124 "2011-08-20T23:09:42Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > Heroic sacrifice gets me every time. Me too. There’s a scene towards the end of The Last Unicorn where they’ve finally found a way down to the Red Bull’s lair. They’re on the beach below Haggard’s castle. Prince Lir has already been knocked down by the Bull once and lost his sword and shield. But he stands up with just his hands up, and the tip of his tongue out in concentration. Just him, between the unicorn and the Bull. I have lost count of the number of times I have read this book, and that scene still gets me Every. Single. Time. The most recent books I’ve cried at was at the end of “I Shall Wear Midnight” by Terry Pratchett. Not so much that the STORY was said, but at the kind of wrapping up of different threads that seemed to be going on. I loves me some Terry Pratchett and it’s just going to destroy me when he’s gone. ---
**Author:** ![Archergal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Archergal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Archergal)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2011, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/125 "2011-08-20T23:16:55Z")
> [@Terrifel](#): > > Honestly? The first book that came to mind: > > **Dog Heaven** by Cynthia Rylant. ZOMG, I know that book. I cry every time I read the words. I don’t even have to see the pictures. ---
**Author:** ![Nightfall1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@Nightfall1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightfall1)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2011, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/126 "2011-08-21T00:08:10Z")
The short story The Ugly Little Boy by Isaac Asimov. Choke up everytime I get to the end. ---
**Author:** ![Taomist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Taomist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taomist)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2011, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/127 "2011-08-21T00:33:01Z")
> [@Nightfall1](#): > > The short story The Ugly Little Boy by Isaac Asimov. Choke up everytime I get to the end. For some reason this reminded me of maybe my first: The Little Matchstick Girl, by H.C. Andersen. \ Heck, it’s short enough…here it is. [http://hca.gilead.org.il/li\_match.html](http://hca.gilead.org.il/li_match.html) ---
**Author:** ![Sigmundex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e19adc/32.png) [@Sigmundex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmundex)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2011, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/128 "2011-08-21T19:02:46Z")
I’ll echo the same two that have appeared a number of times so far - A Prayer for Owen Meany - I was in college at the time, flopped on my couch, when I got to “that part”. When it dawned on me that what was happening at that moment was the whole reason for THE SHOT, I started crying and ended up a mess… and I’m a DUDE! 🙂 And also, as has been mentioned before, in Time Traveller’s Wife, when Henry’s daughter runs up to him in the museum, that makes a wreck of me. In fact, as great as I think that book is, I’ve refused to re-read it because the last third of the book is such a slow descent into misery for all involved. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2011, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262/129 "2011-08-21T21:58:34Z")
I thought I’d replied to this thread in the past, but if I did I can’t find it. I always cry, at least a little, when I read Robert Heinlein’s short story “The Man Who Traveled in Elephants”. The protagonist, Johnny, is watching a fantastic parade, and at one point there are veterans passing in review. _“Johnny thought back to '44 when he had first seen them march, old men and young boys, because the proper “shooters” were away to war. And of something that should not be on Broad Street in Philadelphia on the first day of January, men riding in the parade because, merciful Heaven forgive us, they could not walk.”_ Damn, it took me a while to type that, I was tearing up so much. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-cry-at-a-passage-in-a-novel-or-short-story/474262.md?page=6)