Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Mary Jane Clark

Quote by Mary Jane Clark

Work

That Old Black Magic

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Mary Jane Clark

Browse famous quotes and profile details for Mary Jane Clark. more

You May Also Like

“At the state park, they hiked up to a meadow covered with soft grass and golden poppies. Jerome spread out a blanket, and they lazed in the sunshine and had their lunch. The sliders and sheet cake were a hit, as she had known they would be. The sandwiches had been a food truck staple---thin slices of house-cured pastrami, garlic dill kraut, Swiss cheese, and Russian dressing, the rolls slathered with herb butter and crunchy seeds and salt.”

SandwichesSouthern FoodPicnic
Book:Sugar and Salt
Create image

“It was the kind of feast she loved to fix. She made her falling-apart-tender ribs, smoked on the way-too-fancy patio barbecue and finished in a slow oven. She prepared three kinds of sauce and her very best sides---homemade cornbread with pepper jelly, plates of slow-simmered greens in pot liquor, and a salad of heirloom tomatoes and grilled peaches and herbs from the local farmers’ market, topped with a scoop of burrata cheese. Hummingbird cake for dessert, because who didn't like a hummingbird cake?”

Food PreparationSouthern Food
Book:Sugar and Salt
Create image

“Anyone and everyone taking a writing class knows that the secret of good writing is to cut it back, pare it down, winnow, chop, hack, prune, and trim, remove every superfluous word, compress, compress, compress... Actually, when you think about it, not many novels in the Spare tradition are terribly cheerful. Jokes you can usually pluck out whole, by the roots, so if you're doing some heavy-duty prose-weeding, they're the first to go. And there's some stuff about the whole winnowing process I just don't get. Why does it always stop when the work in question has been reduced to sixty or seventy thousand words--entirely coincidentally, I'm sure, the minimum length for a publishable novel? I'm sure you could get it down to twenty or thirty if you tried hard enough. In fact, why stop at twenty or thirty? Why write at all? Why not just jot the plot and a couple of themes down on the back of an envelope and leave it at that? The truth is, there's nothing very utilitarian about fiction or its creation, and I suspect that people are desperate to make it sound manly, back-breaking labor because it's such a wussy thing to do in the first place. The obsession with austerity is an attempt to compensate, to make writing resemble a real job, like farming, or logging. (It's also why people who work in advertising put in twenty-hour days.) Go on, young writers--treat yourself to a joke, or an adverb! Spoil yourself! Readers won't mind!”

WritingHumorWorkEditing
Book:The Polysyllabic Spree
Create image

“Pa motioned for her to sit at a small table overlooking the wharf. She couldn't read the menu, but he told her most of it, and she ordered fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, white acre peas, and biscuits fluffy as fresh picked cotton. He had fried shrimp, cheese grits, fried "okree," and fried green tomatoes. The waitress put a whole dish of butter pats perched on ice cubes and a basket of cornbread and biscuits on their table, and all the sweet iced tea they could drink. Then they had blackberry cobbler with ice cream for dessert. So full, Kya thought she might get sick, but figured it'd be worth it.”

FullnessSouthern FoodWharf
Book:Where the Crawdads Sing
Create image

“Afterward, Marvina and I fried the chicken, and, I tell you, all hell broke loose when Kerresha tasted the meat. "Oh my God! Holy Jesus and Guadalupe Mary!" Before Marvina could ask her to stop using the Lord's name in vain, Kerresha leaned back in her chair and feigned a heart attack. "Oh my God! Mmm, mmm mmmmm! Where? What kind of voodoo did you put in this chicken?" "Ain't no voodoo here in this house," Marvina bucked. "Yes! There is!" Kerresha licked her fingers. "I promise you. On God." She put a hand on her heart. "This chicken just took me back to the spiritual power of the ancestors." Marvina was so flattered she couldn't be mad. We both looked at each other and laughed, because, truth be told, this was exactly the reaction people gave the first time they tasted Momma's seasoning on expertly fried chicken. "Y'all." Kerresha raised both hands in the air like she was getting happy in a holiness church. "Is it the grease? The seasoning? Chickens raised by unicorns?" "It's the seasoning," my sister and I said simultaneously. Kerresha swallowed another bite. "Whatever y'all put in that seasoning is a miracle. A double miracle, since it also has the power to make y'all finally both agree on something.”

MiraculousFried ChickenSeasoningSouthern FoodEpiphanic Moment
Book:Sisters with a Side of Greens
Create image

“Deciding she'd earned a snack break, Mae moved over to the refreshments table. She slowly walked along it, taking mental inventory: a whole sliced ham, its edges dark and shiny. A colorful macaroni salad speckled with chunks of tomatoes, bell peppers, celery, and carrots in a creamy dressing. Deviled eggs loaded with filling and a healthy shake of paprika. Chunky potato salad a deep shade of golden yellow. Seeing it plucked a string in her chest. Her dad, who considered himself a potato salad connoisseur, said a sign of a good potato salad was what color it was. If it's white, it ain't right, he used to say. She loaded her plate with a little of everything--- and an extra-large scoop of potato salad. Mae brought a forkful to her mouth, tasting a sharp zing of mustard and sweet pickle relish. It was creamy, tangy, and so much better than the pale, bland potato salad Madison's mom made every Easter.”

ColorfulSouthern FoodPotato Salad
Book:The Townsend Family Recipe for Disaster
Create image

“Mae drew closer, bending down to peer at the tiny words written on the ripped scraps of paper. Most of the pieces were no bigger than a Post-it. Smothered chicken. Shrimp and grits. Lamb chops. Fried chicken. Black-eyed peas. Chicken pot pie. Oyster dressing. Corn casserole. Barbecue sauce. Seeing these felt like being reunited with an old friend. The tiny handwriting was unfamiliar, but the dishes jumped out at her like memories. Her dad had talked about some of these. He'd told her about shrimp and grits on those mornings at Skyline Diner. And he'd mentioned oyster dressing and corn casserole once when Mae had asked him what his family ate at Thanksgiving. The barbecue sauce might have been something Althea made a big vat of for their annual Fourth of July event.”

Southern FoodGrandmother CookingFamily Recipes
Book:The Townsend Family Recipe for Disaster
Create image

“The smothered chicken and gravy, collard greens, and the black-eyed peas she'd modified to make vegetarian for Sierra were ready and warm on the stove. The rice waited patiently in the rice cooker on the counter. The corn fritters were warming in the oven. The peach cobbler, fresh out of the oven, cooled on the counter next to a dish she hadn't told the Townsends about, which she'd covered in foil until it was time to bring it out. The entire house smelled heavenly, from the savory garlic and onion to the rich chicken-gravy to the cobbler's sweet cinnamon spice.”

Southern Food
Book:The Townsend Family Recipe for Disaster
Create image