Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Audre Lorde

Quote by Audre Lorde

Work

Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic As Power

This book delves into the significance of the erotic in various aspects of human life, examining its influence on power dynamics and its manifestations in different cultures and historical periods. more

Author

Audre Lorde
Audre Lorde

Audre Lorde, an American writer, poet, and speaker, was born on February 18, 1934, and passed away on November 17, 1992. Known for her profound insights into race, gender, and sexual orientation, her work encompasses poetry, prose, and novels, which have had a profound impact on contemporary literature and social movements. more

You May Also Like

“Nothing had come easy to him. School, sports, or girls... it seemed to Oswald that everyone else had come into this world with a set of instructions but him. From the beginning he had always felt like a pair of white socks and brown shoes in a roomful of tuxedos. He had never really gotten a break in life, and now it was all over.”

“For a moment, Layla glanced at Amar's journals, but she could barely make sense of his handwriting. Each deciphered sentence threatened to unravel her understanding of him and carried with it the threat of more secrets. It did not matter that she was his mother. What she could ever hope to know of him was just a glimpse -- like the beam of a lighthouse skipping out, only one stretch of waves visible at a time, the rest left in the unknowable dark.”

“If you want to leave something for your children, leave a better world, not heaps of money, because at the rate our ancestors screwed up this world and at the rate we are sustaining their stupidity in our pursuit of limitless productivity, soon all the money in the world will not be enough to save our children from imminent disaster.”

“Another form of projection is the projection of one’s own problems on the children. First of all such projection takes place not infrequently in the wish for children. In such cases the wish for children is primarily determined by projecting one’s own problem of existence on that of the children. When a person feels that he has not been able to make sense of his own life, he tries to make sense of it in terms of the life of his children. But one is bound to fail within oneself and for the children. The former because the problem of existence can be solved by each one only for himself, and not by proxy; the latter because one lacks in the very qualities which one needs to guide the children in their own search for an answer. Children serve for projective purposes also when the question arises of dissolving an unhappy marriage. The stock argument of parents in such a situation is that they cannot separate in order not to deprive the children of the blessings of a unified home. Any detailed study would show, however, that the atmosphere of tension and unhappiness within the “unified family” is more harmful to the children than an open break would be-which teaches them at least that man is able to end an intolerable situation by a courageous decision.”

“It is children who are the true realists: they never proceed from generalities. The adult recognizes the general form in a particular example, a representative of the species, dismisses everything else and states: that’s lilac, there’s an ash tree, an apple tree. The child perceives individuals, personalities. He sees the unique form, and doesn’t mask it with a common name or function.”