“We fret about words, we writers. Words mean. Words point. They are arrows. Arrows stuck in the rough hide of reality. And the more portentous, more general the word, the more they can also resemble rooms or tunnels. They can expand, or cave in. They can come to be filled with a bad smell. They will often remind us of other rooms, where we'd rather dwell or where we think we are already living. They can be spaces we lose the art or the wisdom of inhabiting. And eventually those volumes of mental intention we no longer know how to inhabit will be abandoned, boarded up, closed down.” ThinkingKnowsWritingMeanArtRealityLosesSpaceRoomsKnow HowFilledIntentionSmellStuckRoughAbandonedVolumeCavesArrowsTunnelsMean Words Author:Susan Sontag
“I can see my ghost trying to get that Academy Award, forever stuck in a casting office. Can you imagine? I've spent enough time in audition rooms. I don't want to be doing that in my afterlife.” WantTryingI CanEnoughRoomsForeverImagineOfficeStuckGhostAwardsAfterlifeAuditionsCastingAcademyEnough TimeAcademy Awards Author:Rachael Taylor
“I know so well what becomes of unmarried women who aren't prepared to occupy a position. I've seen such pitiful cases in the South barely tolerated spinsters living upon the grudging patronage of sister's husband or brother's wife! stuck away in some little mouse-trap of a room encouraged by one in-law to visit another little birdlike women without any nest eating the crust of humility all their life! Is that the future that we've mapped out for ourselves?” KnowsWellsLittlesLawLife IsRoomsCasesWifePositionHumilityBrotherHusbandEatingPreparedSouthStuckTrapsMiceNestsIn-lawsPitifulUnmarriedMarried WomenPatronageSpinstersMouse Traps Book:The Glass Menagerie Source: The Glass Menagerie
“The clerical work is par for the course. "Keep on file in numerical order" means throw in wastebasket. You'll soon learn the language. "Let it be a challenge to you" means you're stuck with it; "interpersonal relationships" is a fight between kids; "ancillary civic agencies for supportive discipline" means call the cops; "Language Arts Dept." is the English office; "literature based on child's reading level and experiential background" means that's all they've got in the Book Room; "non-academic-minded" is a delinquent; and "It has come to my attention" means you're in trouble.” MeanChildrenArtBookKidsOrderFightingCoursesReadingLiteratureLanguageChallengesLevelsRoomsAttentionTroubleDisciplineOfficeStuckBackgroundsAgencyAcademicCopSupportiveFilesCivicsInterpersonalDelinquentsInterpersonal RelationshipLanguage Arts Book:Up the Down Staircase Source: Up the Down Staircase
“My editor and I remain very disciplined. It's just sometimes when you're making a film, you get into the cutting room and you see a scene that's slowing you down in a certain section, but if you remove that scene then, emotionally or story-wise, another scene a half-hour later won't have the same impact. You just get stuck with it.” IfsSometimesStoriesFilmCertainHoursRoomsHalfWiseCuttingSceneImpactStuckRemoveEditorsSectionsHalf HoursSlowing Author:Alexander Payne