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Dorothy Allison

Dorothy Allison Quotes

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Famous Dorothy Allison Quotes

“Beauty is a hard thing. Beauty is a mean story. Beauty is slender girls who die young, fine-featured delicate creatures about whom men write poems. Beauty, my first girlfriend said to me, is that inner quality often associated with great amounts of leisure time. And I loved her for that.”

MenWritingFirstsMeanSaidHardStoriesYoungDiesGirlQualityFineAmountCreaturesGirlfriendDelicateLeisureHard ThingsSlenderDie YoungLeisure Time
Book:Two Or Three Things I Know for Sure
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“If I could have found what I needed at thirteen, I would not have lost so much of my life chasing vindication or death. Give some child, some thirteen-year old, the hope of the remade life. Tell the truth. Write the story that you were always afraid to tell. I swear to you there is magic in it.”

IfsGivingWritingYearsChildrenStoriesFoundLostMagicNeededIf I CouldTelling The TruthSwearChasingThirteenVindicationThirteen Year Olds
Book:Skin: Talking About Sex, Class, and Literature
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“And of course these days I feel like there is a nation of us - displaced southerners and children of the working class. We listen to Steve Earle, Mary J. Blige, and k.d. lang. We devour paperback novels and tell evil mean stories, value stubbornness above patience and a sense of humor more than a college education. We claim our heritage with a full appreciation of how often it has been disdained. And let me promise you, you do not want to make us angry.”

WantFeelsMeanChildrenHas BeensStoriesValuesCoursesEvilNationsClassNovelCollegePromiseLet MeClaimsAngryAppreciationThese DaysSense Of HumorHeritageMaryWorking ClassStubbornnessCollege EducationSouthernerMary J Blige
Book:Trash
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“For years and years, I convinced myself that I was unbreakable, an animal with an animal strength or something not human at all. Me, I told people, I take damage like a wall, a brick wall that never falls down, never feels anything, never flinches or remembers. I am one woman but I carry in my body all the stories I have ever been told, women I have known, women who have taken damage until they tell themselves they can feel no pain at all.”

PeopleFeelsYearsHumansStoriesBodyPainRememberFallAnimalKnownTakenWallConvincedDamageBricksFalling DownOne WomanNo PainUnbreakableBrick Wall
Author:Dorothy Allison
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“I want hard stories, I demand them from myself. Hard stories are worth the difficulty. It seems to me the only way I have forgiven anything, understood anything, is through that process of opening up to my own terror and pain and reexamining it, re-creating it in the story, and making it something different, making it meaningful - even if the meaning is only in the act of the telling.”

IfsWayWantDifferentHardStoriesSeemsPainProcessMy OwnDemandCreatingUnderstoodDifficultyTerrorMeaningfulOpeningForgivenOpening Up
Author:Dorothy Allison
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