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Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood Quotes

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Famous Margaret Atwood Quotes

“Night falls. Or has fallen. Why is it that night falls, instead of rising, like the dawn? Yet if you look east, at sunset, you can see night rising, not falling; darkness lifting into the sky, up from the horizon, like a black sun behind cloud cover. Like smoke from an unseen fire, a line of fire just below the horizon, brushfire or a burning city. Maybe night falls because it’s heavy, a thick curtain pulled up over the eyes. Wool blanket.”

IfsLooksEyeNightFallBlackLinesCitiesBehindsDarknessSunFireSkyCloudsHeavyEastBurningSmokeDawnFallenRisingSunsetHorizonThickUnseenCurtainsBlanketLiftingWool
Book:The Handmaid's Tale
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“When you are in the middle of a story it isn't a story at all, but only a confusion; a dark roaring, a blindness, a wreckage of shattered glass and splintered wood; like a house in a whirlwind, or else a boat crushed by the icebergs or swept over the rapids, and all aboard powerless to stop it. It's only afterwards that it becomes anything like a story at all. When you are telling it, to yourself or to someone else.”

StoriesHouseDarkMiddleGlassesWoodsConfusionBoatBlindnessPowerlessRapidsCrushedShatteredRoaringIcebergWhirlwindWreckageShattered Glass
Author:Margaret Atwood
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“We have begun to slam doors, and to throw things. I throw my purse, an ashtray, a package of chocolate chips, which breaks on impact. We are picking up chocolate chips for days. Jon throws a glass of milk, the milk, not the glass: he knows his own strength, as I do not. He throws a box of Cheerios, unopened. The things I throw miss, although they are worse things. The things he throws hit, but are harmless. I begin to see how the line is crossed, between histrionics and murder.”

KnowsLinesBreakDoorsMissingMurderImpactGlassesBoxesChocolateMilkChipsPackagesPursesSlamChocolate ChipsAshtrays
Book:Cat's Eye
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“I was unfair to him, of course, but where would I have been without unfairness? In thrall, in harness. Young women need unfairness, it's one of their few defenses. They need their callousness, they need their ignorance. They walk in the dark, along the edges of high cliffs, humming to themselves, thinking themselves invulnerable.”

ThinkingNeedsHas BeensYoungCoursesDarkWalksIgnoranceEdgesDefenseUnfairYoung WomenCliffsHarnessUnfairnessHummingCallousness
Book:Cat's Eye
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“All Creatures know that some must die That all the rest may take and eat; Sooner or later, all transform Their blood to wine, their flesh to meat. But Man alone seeks Vengefulness, And writes his abstract Laws on stone; For this false Justice he has made, He tortures limb and crushes bone. Is this the image of a god? My tooth for yours, your eye for mine? Oh, if Revenge did move the stars Instead of Love, they would not shine.”

IfsKnowsMenWritingMayMadeEyeMovingLawDiesStarsJusticeBloodMinesCreaturesStonesWineShiningBonesRevengeFleshTeethMeatTortureAbstractCrushSooner Or LaterLimbs
Book:The Year Of The Flood
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“The prospect of his future life stretched before him like a sentence; not a prison sentence but a long-winded sentence with a lot of unnecessary subordinate clauses, as he was soon in the habit of quipping during Happy Hour pickup time at the local campus bars and pubs. He couldn’t say he was looking forward to it, this rest-of-his-life.”

LongHoursHabitPrisonSentencesBarsLocalsUnnecessaryLooking ForwardCampusSubordinatesPubsClausesFuture LifePickupsHappy Hour
Book:Oryx And Crake
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“But we still find the world astounding, we can't get enough of it; even as it shrivels, even as its many lights flicker and are extinguished (the tigers, the leopard frogs, the plunging dolphin flukes), flicker and are extinguished, by us, by us, we gaze and gaze. Where do you draw the line, between love and greed? We never did know, we always wanted more. We want to take it all in, for one last time, we want to eat the world with our eyes.”

KnowsWorldWantStillsEnoughLightEyeWantedLastsLinesDrawsGreedLast TimeTigersFrogsDolphinsFlickerLeopardsFlukes
Author:Margaret Atwood
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“I tried to visualize my jealousy as a yellowy-brown cloud boiling around inside me, then going out through my nose like smoke and turning into a stone and falling down into the ground. That did work a little. But in my visualization a plant covered with poison berries would grow out of the stone, whether I wanted it to or not.”

LittlesWantedFallGrowsStonesPlantCloudsSmokeNosesPoisonBrownCoveredGoing OutFalling DownVisualizationBerriesBoiling
Author:Margaret Atwood
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