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Amy Hempel

Amy Hempel Books

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“I know when a story is finished when there is not a single thing more I can think to do to it. And since I know at the start what the last line will be, I know when I've reached that point as logically as I can that it's finished. As for the rewriting-it's not foolproof, of course, but if you're honest about having thought of every possibility and you still come back to what you have, what more can you do?”

IfsThinkingKnowsWritingStillsI CanStoriesLastsCoursesLinesHonestPossibilityFinishedRewritingFoolproof
Author:Amy Hempel
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“I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands. In the course of the experiment, that chimp had a baby. Imagine how her trainers must have thrilled when the mother, without prompting, began to sign her newborn. Baby, drink milk. Baby, play ball. And when the baby died, the mother stood over the body, her wrinkled hands moving with animal grace, forming again and again the words: Baby, come hug, Baby come hug, fluent now in the language of grief.”

ThinkingPlayBodyHandsMovingMotherCoursesLanguageAnimalGriefTalkingGraceImagineBabyDrinkBallsDiedExperimentsMilkHugAgain And AgainTrainersNewbornFluentNewborn BabyDrink Milk
Book:The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
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“A five-hour flight works out to three days and nights on land, by rail, from sea to shining sea. You can chalk off the hours on the back of the seat ahead. But seventy-some hours will not seem so long to you if you tell yourself first: This is where I am going to be for the rest of my natural life.”

IfsFirstsLongSeemsNightThreeHoursNaturalFiveSeaLandShiningWork OutFlightSeatsSeventiesDay And NightRailChalkNatural Life
Book:The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
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“I have written letters that are failures, but I have written few, I think, that are lies. Trying to reach a person means asking the same question over and over again: Is this the truth, or not? I begin this letter to you, then, in the western tradition. If I understand it, the western tradition is: Put your cards on the table.”

IfsThinkingTryingMeanPersonsLyingWrittenTraditionLettersAskingTablesWesternCardsCards On The Table
Book:The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
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“The worst of it is over now, and I can't say that I am glad. Lose that sense of loss—you have gone and lost something else. But the body moves toward health. The mind, too, in steps. One step at a time. Ask a mother who has just lost a child, How many children do you have? "Four," she will say, "—three," and years later, "Three," she will say, "—four.”

YearsMindChildrenI CanBodyMovingMotherThreeAsksLostLosesLossStepsGoneFourWorstGladOne Step At A Time
Book:The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
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“It was like that class at school where the teacher talks about Realization, about how you could realize something big in a commonplace thing. The example he gave--and the liar said it really happened--was that once while drinking orange juice, he'd realized he would be dead someday. He wondered if we, his students, had had similar 'realizations.' Is he kidding? I thought. Once I cashed a paycheck and I realized it wasn't enough. Once I had food poisoning, and realized I was trapped inside my body.”

IfsSaidEnoughBodyBigsWould BeSchoolRealizingClassTeacherHappenedExampleStudentsDrinkingI RealizedRealizationSomedayLiarsTrappedOrangeJuiceCommonplacePaychecksPoisoningOrange JuiceFood Poisoning
Author:Amy Hempel
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