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Marge Piercy

Marge Piercy Quotes

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Famous Marge Piercy Quotes

“In fiction, I exercise my nosiness. I am as curious as my cats, and indeed that has led to trouble often enough and used up several of my nine lives. I am an avid listener. I am fascinated by other people's lives, the choices they make and how that works out through time, what they have done and left undone, what they tell me and what they keep secret and silent, what they lie about and what they confess, what they are proud of and what shames them, what they hope for and what they fear. The source of my fiction is the desire to understand people and their choices through time.”

PeopleDoneEnoughUsedLyingDesireChoicesLeftSecretFictionTroubleSourceProudExerciseCatShameSilentWork OutNineCuriousFascinatedListenersUndoneRough TimesAvidNine Lives
Author:Marge Piercy
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“I was a working class Jewish girl. In my girlhood, anti-Semitism was a daily fact of life in Detroit. I did not come from people who had many options in their lives or many choices open to them. I was a girl in a family in which women were, as in society at large, very much second-class citizens. I did not see why I should accept these forced limitations without a fight. Being free to make my own choices thus became very important to me at an early age.”

PeopleShouldImportantFactsAgeChoicesGirlFightingMy OwnAcceptingClassCitizensLimitationWorking ClassDetroitFacts Of LifeAnti SemitismBeing FreeMy GirlGirlhoodSecond Class Citizens
Author:Marge Piercy
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“Listening is terribly important if you want to understand anything about people. You listen to what they say and how they say it, what they share and what they are reticent about, what they tell truthfully and what they lie about, what they hope for and what they fear, what they are proud of, what they are ashamed of. If you don't pay attention to other people, how can you understand their choices through time and how their stories come out?”

PeopleIfsWantImportantStoriesLyingChoicesPayAttentionShareListeningProudPay AttentionAshamedRough Times
Author:Marge Piercy
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“I want to be with people who submerge in the task, who go into the fields to harvest and work in a row and pass the bags along, who are not parlor generals and field deserters but move in a common rhythm when the food must come in or the fire be put out. The work of the world is common as mud. Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust. But the thing worth doing well done has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.”

PeopleWorldWantWellsDoneHandsMovingCommonFireFieldsShapesTasksCleanRhythmDustBagsEvidentHarvestMudWell DoneParlor
Book:Circles on the Water
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“Writing is a futile attempt to preserve what disappears moment by moment. All that remains of my mother is what I remember and what I have written for and about her. Eventually that is all that will remain of [my husband] and me. Writing sometimes feels frivolous and sometimes sacred, but memory is one of my strongest muses. I serve her with my words. So long as people read, those we love survive however evanescently. As do we writers, saying with our life's work, Remember. Remember us. Remember me.”

PeopleFeelsWritingLongSometimesMomentsRememberMotherMemoriesOur LivesWrittenHusbandRemainsSacredDisappearPreservesMy HusbandStrongestMuseFrivolousRemember MeThose We LoveAll That Remains
Author:Marge Piercy
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