There are worse words than cuss-words, there are words that hurt. — Tillie Olsen Cuss Copy Share Image
The clock talked loud. I threw it away, it scared me what it talked. — Tillie Olsen Clock Copy Share Image
She would not exchange her solitude for anything. Never again to be forced to move to the rhythms of others. — Tillie Olsen Forced Copy Share Image
Writers in a profit making economy are an exploitable commodity whose works are products to be marketed, and are so judged and… — Tillie Olsen Commodity Copy Share Image
That's what I want to be when I grow up, just a peaceful wreck holding hands with other peaceful wrecks. — Tillie Olsen Growing up Copy Share Image
More than in any other human relationship, overwhelmingly more, motherhood means being instantly interruptible, responsive, and responsible — Tillie Olsen Human relations Copy Share Image
Lighting does occasionally strike and occasional the result isn't a corpse. — Tillie Olsen Corpses Copy Share Image
Better mankind born without mouths and stomachs than always to worry about money to buy, to shop, to fix, to cook, to… — Tillie Olsen Better man Copy Share Image
I could not live by literature if only to begin with, because of the slow maturing of my work and its special… — Tillie Olsen Books Copy Share Image
I know that I haven’t powers enough to divide myself into one who earns and one who creates. — Tillie Olsen Divide Copy Share Image
The fact that human beings do not put up forever with misery, humiliation, degradation, actual physical deprivation but act is a fact… — Tillie Olsen Degradation Copy Share Image
Think about all that we've lost that has been said orally because nobody was taking it down. I feel very fortunate to… — Tillie Olsen America Copy Share Image
“Unlike men writers who marry, most will not have the societal equivalent of a wife-- nor (in a society hostile to growing… — Tillie Olsen Children Copy Share Image
I very much dislike the word "race," and I never use it. I use the word "racist." Race is not a fact.… — Tillie Olsen Color Copy Share Image
Literature is a place for generosity and affection and hunger for equals - not a prizefight ring. We are increased, confirmed in… — Tillie Olsen Achievement Copy Share Image
“She kept too much in herself. Her life was such that she had to keep too much in herself. My wisdom came… — Tillie Olsen Children Copy Share Image
Literary history and the present are dark with silences . . . I have had special need to learn all I could… — Tillie Olsen Agony Copy Share Image
“An old man, Elias Caldwell, death already smothering his breast, tries to tell a child something of all he has learned, something… — Tillie Olsen Death Copy Share Image
“But there is more – to rebel against what will not let life be.” — Tillie Olsen Life Copy Share Image
And when is there time to remember, to sift, to weigh, to estimate, to total? — Tillie Olsen Estimate Copy Share Image
It is a long baptism into the seas of humankind, my daughter. Better immersion than to live untouched. — Tillie Olsen Baptism Copy Share Image
“What in me demanded that goodness in her? And what was the cost, the cost to her of such goodness?” — Tillie Olsen Demanded Copy Share Image
It's hard for me to talk about the terrible things that have happened in my lifetime because they didn't need to be. — Tillie Olsen Happened Copy Share Image
Women have the right to say: this is surface, this falsifies reality, this degrades. — Tillie Olsen Feminism Copy Share Image
Be critical. Women have the right to say: This is surface, this falsifies reality, this degrades. — Tillie Olsen Critical Copy Share Image
Not everybody feels religion the same way. Some it's in their mouth, but some it's like a hope in their blood, their… — Tillie Olsen Blood Copy Share Image
It is distraction, not meditation, that becomes habitual; interruption, not continuity; spasmodic, not constant toil. — Tillie Olsen Constant Copy Share Image
Time granted does not necessarily coincide with time that can be most fully used. — Tillie Olsen Granted Copy Share Image
Compared to men writers of like distinction and years of life, few women writers have had lives of unbroken productivity, or leave… — Tillie Olsen Behinds Copy Share Image
The habits of a lifetime when everything else had to come before writing are not easily broken, even when circumstances now often… — Tillie Olsen Accumulation Copy Share Image
“Mazie sits with a sense of non-being over her – of it being someone other than she sitting there timeless, suspended in… — Tillie Olsen Feeling Copy Share Image
“It is a long Baptism into the seas of humankind, my daughter. Better immersion and in pain than to live untouched. Yet… — Tillie Olsen Children Copy Share Image
