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Anne Fadiman

Anne Fadiman Books

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“So, if you're a doctor, how can you recognize that you're having a feeling? Some tips from Dr. Zinn: Most emotions have physical counterparts. Anxiety may be associated with a tightness of the abdomen or excessive diaphoresis; anger may be manifested by a generalized muscle tightness or a clenching of the jaw; sexual arousal may be noted by a tingling of the loins or piloerection; and sadness may be felt by conjunctival injection or heaviness of the chest.”

EmotionMedicine
Book:The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures
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“When he looked back at the menu as an old man, it brought back everything; the food, the wine, the private dining room, the pride he took in being able to pay for such a dinner, the convergence of his life as a writer and his life as an oenophile, the conviviality that grew as the night continued and everyone had a little too much to drink but not enough to impair the quality of the conversation, some of which, I feel sure, was about the wines themselves.”

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Book:The Wine Lover's Daughter: A Memoir
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“Muses are fickle, and many a writer, peering into the voice, has escaped paralysis by ascribing the creative responsibility to a talisman: a lucky charm, a brand of paper, but most often a writing instrument. Am I writing well? Thank my pen. Am I writing badly? Don't blame me blame my pen. By such displacements does the fearful imagination defend itself.”

WritingWellsDoeVoiceImaginationResponsibilityCreativeLuckyPaperBlameInstrumentsBrandsCharmPensFearfulMuseFickleParalysisDisplacementBlame MeWriting WellTalismansLucky CharmsDon't Blame Me
Author:Anne Fadiman
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“My daughter is seven, and some of the other second-grade parents complain that their children don't read for pleasure. When I visit their homes, the children's rooms are crammed with expensive books, but the parent's rooms are empty. Those children do not see their parents reading, as I did every day of my childhood. By contrast, when I walk into an apartment with books on the shelves, books on the bedside tables, books on the floor, and books on the toilet tank, then I know what I would see if I opened the door that says 'PRIVATE--GROWNUPS KEEP OUT': a child sprawled on the bed, reading.”

IfsKnowsChildrenBookHomeReadingParentWalksPleasureRoomsDoorsChildhoodBedDaughterEmptyTablesSevenComplainingExpensiveGradesMy DaughterContrastApartmentShelvesToiletsTanksGrownups
Author:Anne Fadiman
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“Some day, as soon as a book is printed it will be simultaneously put into digital form. That will be a wonderful research tool, but it will never substitute for holding the book. I feel certain that at least within my lifetime, everyone will still be going to the bookstore and buying printed books. Thank God I'll die before I have to worry about whether the printed book itself will disappear. That's something I don't want to live to see.”

WantFeelsStillsBookFormCertainDiesWorryWonderfulResearchToolsLifetimeDisappearBuyingDigitalSubstitutesThank GodPrintedBookstoresPrinted Books
Author:Anne Fadiman
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“Some friends of theirs had rented their house for several months to an interior decorator. When they returned, they discovered that their entire library had been reorganized by color and size. Shortly thereafter, the decorator met with a fatal automobile accident. I confess that when this story was told, everyone around the dinner table concurred that justice had been served.”

StoriesHouseJusticeColorMonthsMetsTablesLibrarySizeDinnerAccidentsInteriorsAutomobileDinner TableDecorators
Book:Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader
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“When the Irish novelist John McGahern was a child, his sisters unlaced and removed one of his shoes while he was reading. He did not stir. They placed a straw hat on his head. No response. Only when they took away the wooden chair on which he was sitting did he, as he puts it, 'wake out of the book'.”

ChildrenBookReadingSittingResponseShoesNovelistsHatsChairsStrawsNo ResponseStraw Hats
Book:Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader
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“I have always felt that the action most worth watching is not at the center of things but where edges meet. I like shorelines, weather fronts, international borders. There are interesting frictions and incongruities in these places, and often, if you stand at the point of tangency, you can see both sides better than if you were in the middle of either one.”

IfsActionFeltSidesInterestingMiddleFrontsInternationalEdgesWeatherBordersBoth SidesFrictionIncongruityShoreline
Author:Anne Fadiman
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“Something amazing happens when the rest of the world is sleeping. I am glued to my chair. I forget that I ever wanted to do anything but write. The crowded city, the crowded apartment, and the crowded calendar suddenly seem spacious. Three or four hours pass in a moment; I have no idea what time it is, because I never check the clock. If I chose to listen, I could hear the swish of taxis bound for downtown bars or the soft saxophone riffs that drift from a neighbor's window, but nothing gets through. I am suspended in a sensory deprivation tank, and the very lack of sensation is delicious.”

IfsWorldWritingIdeasMomentsSeemsHappensWantedThreeHoursSleepForgetCitiesFourWindowBoundsNeighborBarsChecksNo IdeaClockChairsSensationsApartmentDeliciousTanksCrowdedTaxiCalendarsSensoryDeprivationSuspendedDowntownSaxophoneSensory DeprivationCrowded Cities
Book:At Large and At Small: Familiar Essays
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