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Quote by Margaret Atwood

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Morning in the Burned House: Poems

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Author

Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood is a renowned Canadian poet, novelist, playwright, and critic, born on November 18, 1939. Her works are known for their unique style and profound insights into social issues, with notable titles including 'The Handmaid's Tale' and 'Cat's Eye'. more

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“He started to draw. He drew from memory. He had a good memory, something which, all things considered, was far from a blessing. The pencils moved quickly across the paper, scratching back and forth in deepening shades of grey. He leaned low over the paper, concentrating all his energy on his work. The candles flickered and dripped wax, having nothing better to do. Eventually he lifted his head and looked at his creation. The face of a young woman stared back at him from the paper, a slight smile playing on her lips. She looked as if she was about to say something, and that once she had you would laugh. She looked happy. Seven stared at the picture, his strange eyes unreadable – eyes that, now he made no effort to mask them, were from edge to edge only the deep blue of the dead ocean. He swallowed hard, as if he was trying to imbibe something foul tasting but necessary, like a child sipping medicine, and pulled another sheet of paper from his desk.”

“What big eyes you have. Eyes of an incomparable luminosity, the numinous phosphorescence of the eyes of lycanthropes. The gelid green of your eyes fixes my reflective face; It is a preservative, like a green liquid amber; it catches me. I am afraid I will be trapped in it for ever like the poor little ants and flies that stuck their feet in resin before the sea covered the Baltic. He winds me into the circle of his eye on a reel of birdsong. There is a black hole in the middle of both your eyes; it is their still centre, looking there makes me giddy, as if I might fall into it.”

“Of course a miracle may happen, and you may be a great painter, but you must confess the chances are a million to one against it. It'll be an awful sell if at the end you have to acknowledge you've made a hash of it." "I've got to paint," he repeated. "Supposing you're never anything more than third-rate, do you think it will have been worth while to give up everything? After all, in any other walk in life it doesn't matter if you're not very good; you can get along quite comfortably if you're just adequate; but it's different with an artist." "You blasted fool," he said. "I don't see why, unless it's folly to say the obvious." "I tell you I've got to paint. I can't help myself. When a man falls into the water it doesn't matter how he swims, well or badly: he's got to get out or else he'll drown.”