“You plant two sunflower seeds in a pot of rich soil. You water them with the same can, at the same time, with the same portions. You rotate the pot daily so they get equal access to the sunlight. Yet on some early, pertinent day, perhaps there is a cloud across the sky, and the plant on the left doesn’t get quite the strength of light that the one on the right does. Or there is a worm in the soil in one quadrant of the pot who eats through more of these roots here than those ones there. Who can say. Sisters are not flowers. And parents can never, from the first day, give the same water and light and soil to one girl that they gave to her sister. Sisters grow, if they grow together at all, in adjacent sorrow.”
Quote by Gregory Maguire
Work
Elphie: A Wicked Childhood
Browse quotes and source details for this work. more
Author
Gregory Maguire
Gregory Maguire is an American novelist known for his reinterpretation of classic fairy tales. His works are characterized by profound moral implications and rich imagination, which have won him a wide audience. more
You May Also Like
“Normally, I avoided baking like it was… well, influenza, but for Christmas cookies, I’d sacrifice”
Source: In Thy Tender Care
Source: In an Absent Dream
Source: Fine Young People: A Novel
Source: Dear Evil Stepmother: A Wicked Little Handbook for the Women Fairy Tales Got Dead Wrong
Source: The Women of Wild Hill
Source: When Mist and Brine Touch
Source: The Irish Goodbye: Micro-Memoirs
Source: Always and Forever, Lara Jean
Source: Blue Sisters