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Quote by Deborah Levy

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Things I Don't Want to Know

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Deborah Levy
Deborah Levy

Deborah Levy, born in 1959, is a distinguished playwright from the United Kingdom. Her works are known for their profound psychological insights and sharp social commentary. Levy's writing spans a variety of themes, including family, love, politics, and identity. more

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“Mary Anning and I are hunting fossils on the beach, she her creatures, I my fish. Our eyes are fastened to the sand and rocks as we make our way along the shore at different paces, first one in front, then the other. Mary stops to split open a nodule and find what may be lodged within. I dig through clay, searching for something new and miraculous. We say very little, for we do not need to. We are silent together, each in her own world, knowing the other is just at her back.”

“Así queda en parte explicado que a menudo las mujeres sean imprescindibles a los hombres. Y también así se entiende mejor por qué a los hombres les intranquilizan tanto las críticas de las mujeres; por qué las mujeres no les pueden decir este libro es malo, este cuadro es flojo o lo que sea sin causar mucho más dolor y provocar mucha más cólera de los que causaría y provocaría un hombre que hiciera la misma crítica. Porque si ellas se ponen a decir la verdad, la imagen del espejo se encoge; la robustez del hombre ante la vida disminuye. ¿Cómo va a emitir juicios, civilizar indígenas, hacer leyes, escribir libros, vestirse de etiqueta y hacer discursos en los banquetes si a la hora del desayuno y de la cena no puede verse a sí mismo por lo menos de tamaño doble de lo que es?”

“I see in marriage, as it at present exists, two opposing forces which it was the task of the lawgiver to reconcile. ... The laws were made by old men—any woman can see that—and they have been prudent enough to decree that conjugal love, apart from passion, is not degrading, and that a woman in yielding herself may dispense with the sanction of love, provided the man can legally call her his. In their exclusive concern for the family they have imitated Nature, whose one care is to propagate the species. Formerly I was a person, now I am a chattel. Not a few tears have I gulped down, alone and far from every one. ...”

“Girls are not meant to think like this. So they say. They never ask us what we actually do think- certainly not without telling us first what it is we should be thinking. And if we are not thinking what they have said we should then they say our thinking is wrong. If we tell them (men) what we think, they correct our thoughts. Thoughts leave our brains, exit via our mouths, hang in the air. ready to be shot down by their artillery all day long! We say we think a thing and they (men) ignore it or they (still men) say we just don't fully understand it. Then they expect silence. Or an apology. If neither is forthcoming, they look away. Perhaps they walk out a door. They rewrite the words that come out our mouths by teaching us to edit them inside our brains. No?”