--- title: "2 Helen Quotes By Margaret Atwood" description: "2 Helen quotes by Margaret Atwood. Plus more from Margaret Atwood and more Helen sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg" --- > [“Helen of Troy Does Counter Dancing The world is full of women who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself if they had the chance. Quit dancing. Get some self-respect and a day job. Right. And minimum wage, and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-world-is-full-of-women-who-d/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg) > [ I saw all of the films \[based on The Tempest\] available, including the one with Helen Mirren in which Prospero is Prospera - you wonder, "Would it work?" But it does, because anything she does works. ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-tempest-available-including-the/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c25/margaret-atwood-40_available_i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-temp_2668077.jpg) ## Other authors on Helen ## More by Margaret Atwood > [“I'm fine," said Pilar, "for the moment. And the moment is the only time we can be fine in.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/i-m-fine-said-pilar-for-the-moment-and-the-moment-is-the-only-time-we/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [And yet it disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/and-yet-it-disturbs-me-to-learn-i-have-hurt-someone-unintentionally-i/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“Mary: Some call this "Eve's curse," but I think that is stupid because the real curse of Eve was having to put up with…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/mary-some-call-this-eve-s-curse-but-i-think-that-is-stupid-because/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“The birds were singing around me, but I reflected that the very birds were strangers to me, for I did not even know their…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/the-birds-were-singing-around-me-but-i-reflected-that-the-very-birds/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“Strange how we decorate pain. These ribbons, for instance, and the small hard teardrops of blood. Who are they for? Do we think the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/strange-how-we-decorate-pain-these-ribbons-for-instance-and-the-small/) [margaret atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [I wanted to forget the past, but it refused to forget me; it waited for sleep, then cornered me.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/i-wanted-to-forget-the-past-but-it-refused-to-forget-me-it-waited-for/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“Back at home they drew the curtains and read, with disapproval, with relish, with avidity and glee - even the ones who'd never thought…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/back-at-home-they-drew-the-curtains-and-read-with-disapproval-with/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“It's my fault. I am forgetting too much.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/it-s-my-fault-i-am-forgetting-too-much/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [All fiction is about people, unless it's about rabbits pretending to be people. It's all essentially characters in action, which means characters moving through…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/all-fiction-is-about-people-unless-it-s-about-rabbits-pretending-to/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“Simon walks back to the house alone. The night is clear and warm, with a moon, almost full, enclosed in a nimbus of mist;…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/simon-walks-back-to-the-house-alone-the-night-is-clear-and-warm-with/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“There is indeed something delightful about being able to combine obedience and disobedience in the same act.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/there-is-indeed-something-delightful-about-being-able-to-combine/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“Every time the women appear, Snowman is astonished all over again. They're every known colour from the deepest black to whitest white, they're various…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/every-time-the-women-appear-snowman-is-astonished-all-over-again-they/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [Once you publish a book, it is out of your control. You cannot dictate how people read it.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/once-you-publish-a-book-it-is-out-of-your-control-you-cannot-dictate/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“The more difficult it was to love the particular man beside us, the more we believed in Love, abstract and total. We were waiting,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/the-more-difficult-it-was-to-love-the-particular-man-beside-us-the/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) > [“She knows she's deceiving herself about that, but she prefers to deceive herself. She desperately needs to believe such pure joy is still possible.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/she-knows-she-s-deceiving-herself-about-that-but-she-prefers-to/) [Margaret Atwood](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/margaret-atwood/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/helen/margaret-atwood/#itemlist", "name": "2 Helen Quotes By Margaret Atwood", "numberOfItems": 2, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Helen of Troy Does Counter Dancing The world is full of women who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself if they had the chance. Quit dancing. Get some self-respect and a day job. Right. And minimum wage, and varicose veins, just standing in one place for eight hours behind a glass counter bundled up to the neck, instead of naked as a meat sandwich. Selling gloves, or something. Instead of what I do sell. You have to have talent to peddle a thing so nebulous and without material form. Exploited , they'd say. Yes, any way you cut it, but I've a choice of how, and I'll take the money. I do give value. Like preachers, I sell vision, like perfume ads, desire or its facsimile. Like jokes or war, it's all in the timing. I sell men back their worst suspicions: that everything's for sale, and piecemeal. They gaze at me and see a chain-saw murder just before it happens, when thigh, ass, inkblot, crevice, tit, and nipple are still connected. Such hatred leaps in them, my beery worshipers! That, or a bleary hopeless love. Seeing the rows of heads and upturned eyes, imploring but ready to snap at my ankles, I understand floods and earthquakes, and the urge to step on ants. I keep the beat, and dance for them because they can't. The music smells like foxes, crisp as heated metal searing the nostrils or humid as August, hazy and languorous as a looted city the day after, when all the rape's been done already, and the killing, and the survivors wander around looking for garbage to eat, and there's only a bleak exhaustion. Speaking of which, it's the smiling tires me out the most. This, and the pretense that I can't hear them. And I can't, because I'm after all a foreigner to them. The speech here is all warty gutturals, obvious as a slam of ham, but I come from the province of the gods where meaning are lilting and oblique. I don't let on to everyone, but lean close, and I'll whisper: My mothers was raped by a holy swan. You believe that? You can take me out to dinner. That's what we tell all the husbands. There sure are a lot of dangerous birds around. Not that anyone here but you would understand. The rest of them would like to watch me and feel nothing. Reduce me to components as in a clock factory or abattoir. Crush out the mystery. Wall me up alive in my own body. They'd like to see through me, but nothing is more opaque than absolute transparency. Look - my feet don't hit the marble! Like breath or a balloon, I'm rising, I hover six inches in the air in my blazing swan-egg of light. You think I'm not a goddess? Try me. This is a torch song. Touch me and you'll burn.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Margaret Atwood" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-world-is-full-of-women-who-d/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Helen of Troy Does Counter Dancing The world is full of women who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself if…” — Margaret Atwood", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "I saw all of the films [based on The Tempest] available, including the one with Helen Mirren in which Prospero is Prospera - you wonder, \"Would it work?\" But it does, because anything she does works.", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Margaret Atwood" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/margaret-atwood/i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-tempest-available-including-the/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c25/margaret-atwood-40_available_i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-temp_2668077.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c25/margaret-atwood-40_available_i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-temp_2668077.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c25/margaret-atwood-40_available_i-saw-all-of-the-films-based-on-the-temp_2668077.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“I saw all of the films [based on The Tempest] available, including the one with Helen Mirren in which…” — Margaret Atwood", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } } ] }, { "@type": "CollectionPage", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/helen/margaret-atwood/#webpage", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/helen/margaret-atwood/", "name": "Helen Quotes by Margaret Atwood", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/helen/margaret-atwood/#itemlist" }, "primaryImageOfPage": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/2a3/margaret-atwood-40_atwood_helen-of-troy-does-counter-dancing-the-w_248920.jpg" }, "description": "2 Helen quotes by Margaret Atwood. 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