“Leak the air from their tires, call them in the middle of the night whispering sour nothings, let their dogs out of their yards... these men who hurt you, who wrong you, who hit you, make them miserable in every way you can. Some would call it spite, for women it will be called spite and being vindictive; while injured men receive their justice and pass out their vengeance, women will be called petty and catty, won't get to feel the honor a word like revenge endows upon men. You will. Inside you will declare it. You will declare victory when you hurt them back and move on from them faster than a machine hems a jean...”
Source: Wandering Stars
“People who do you wrong will almost always blame you for it.”
Source: Origin: Music, Art, Yoga & Consciousness
“Just be yourself, darling," Frederique said. "That is all you ever have to do. And if, for some reason, being yourself is not enough for some man, then you don't want any part of him.”
Source: The Light Always Breaks
“Truth even in the most whispered tones will always roar.”
“But perhaps because Elizabeth was a woman and not, in his view, a direct competitor …”
Source: Elizabeth Bishop: A Miracle for Breakfast
“How unfair society was! Male employees had to pretend to be capable of doing things they couldn’t do, while female employees had to pretend to be incapable of doing things they actually could do. Over the years, how many women had seen their talents magically disappear in that way? How many men had seen talents they didn’t possess magically summoned into existence?”
Source: Where the Wild Ladies Are
“Para ser una sociedad con una estructura descaradamente patriarcal y una cultura que a menudo era furiosamente misógina, a los antiguos romanos les encantaba educar a las mujeres. Parece que en los siglos I antes y después de Cristo (la época mejor documentada) un número significativo de ciudadanas, incluidas algunas que no pertenecían a la élite, estaban en parte alfabetizadas. Varios escritores mencionan, sin mostrar sorpresa, que tanto niñas como niños asistían a las escuelas elementales de precio medio que enseñaban a leer, escribir, aritmética y, en ocasiones, las bases de la literatura a los hijos de las clases medias-altas en las esquinas sombreadas de los foros de las ciudades italianas. Fragmentos de los grafitis de Pompeya, garabateados en los muros de los espacios públicos de las ciudades ("Rómula se tiró aquí a Estafilo", "Serena odia a Isidoro" "Atimeto me dejó preñada") sugieren que algunas mujeres de estratos sociales más bajos podían al menos escribir nombres y unas pocas frases.”
Source: Messalina: Empress, Adulteress, Libertine: The Story of the Most Notorious Woman of the Roman World
“Ike Ryan had a theory about making a girl become part of an orgy. You make her do it with you, then with a friend while you watch, then with another girl—and by then you've cut her down to size. Once she's gone along with that scene, she can't play games—none of that "send me flowers" jazz. You've reduced her to what every woman is, once you've stripped off the fancy manners: a broad.”
Source: The Love Machine
“In one way, the whole official culture of the Islamic Republic was on guard to control women. In another way it was the women setting boundaries on men. Instead of the old context where male space was public but dangerous, and women’s space was safe but private, now whole segments of public space were reserved for women.”
Source: Mother Persia: Women in Iran's History
“You would think women would want to stick together when there weren't that many of them, but they never did. It was as if being a woman was a disease that you didn't wish to catch. As long as you didn't associate with the other women, you could imply to the majority, the men: I'm not like those other ones.”
Source: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow