Alive Quote by Mary Gaitskill

“I think the closest thing I can come to defining what that vital thing is for me - is that there's a sort of soul-quality in writing, if it's any good. It has a spirit or an energy to it that is very integral to who the writer is on a deep level. It's almost a cellular thing. It takes place in the…” quote by Mary Gaitskill — Download Open image

“I think the closest thing I can come to defining what that vital thing is for me - is that there's a sort of soul-quality in writing, if it's any good. It has a spirit or an energy to it that is very integral to who the writer is on a deep level. It's almost a cellular thing. It takes place in the cells of the writing, and it is what makes it alive or not.”

Mary Gaitskill

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Alive Cells Cellular Closest Defining Energy I can Ifs Levels Quality Soul Spirit Thinking Writing

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“I carry love wrapped in pain. That is my treasure and soon it will be yours.”

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“God famously doesn't afflict Job because of anything Job has done, but because he wants to prove a point to Satan. Twenty years later, I am sympathetic with my first assessment; to me, in spite of the soft radiant beauty of many of its passages, the Bible still has a mechanical quality, a refusal to brook complexity that feels brutal…

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“...loading your brain with subliminal messages… How loathsome to turn a sadistic murder into entertainment [in the newspaper] -- and yet how hard not to read about it. What dark comedy to realize that you are scanning for descriptions of torture as you disapprove. Which of course only makes it more entertaining. "But naturally I was hoping they'd report something…

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“The place Joanne is building inside [herself] has rooms for all of this. Not just rooms. Beautiful ones. For Karl and Jerry and Karen and Nate in his cowboy hat and the hot-tub guy and movie directors and old-lady healers and people trying to love their asses and people who think they're stupid for it. In these rooms, each thing…

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The best definition I've heard is that guilt is about what you've done, shame is about who you are. If something's out of my control, I don't feel shame about it, because what could I have done? If you're guilty, you can at least try to atone for it or make it better or not do it again. If it's…

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When my first book came out, it was very disorienting. My health went south. I didn't know how to relate to people. I thought, "Now I have this way to be in the world that's going to be wonderful. It'll be like driving a great car, really streamlined." But it actually was difficult because, if you have a public persona,…

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When he held her that way, she felt so happy that it disturbed her. After he left, it would take her hours to fall asleep, and then when she woke up she would feel another onrush of agitated happiness, which was a lot like panic. She wished she could grab the happiness and mash it into a ball and hoard…

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Explore all 87 Mary Gaitskill quotes

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I understand that it's the music that keeps me alive... That's my lifeblood. And to give that up for, like, the TV, the cars, the houses - that's not the American dream. That's the booby prize, in the end. Those are the booby prizes. And if you fall for them - if, when you achieve them, you believe that this…

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I feel very grateful to be alive and well enough to make music.

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I don't crave applause. I'm not one of those guys who comes alive on stage. I'm much more alive at home, I think.

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We must master our egoism, and through this mastery, step outside ourselves and educate ourselves in giving. Fasting requires that we rediscover all that…

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I can't say that there are 'things' that make me come alive. There are thoughts that make me come alive.

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We're like the wicked witch. We promise gingerbread, then eat the little brats alive.

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If Jovan Belcher didn't possess a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today.

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Peace is an ongoing process. It begins with the first step and it does not end. We, all of us alive today, are the…

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I think adoption becomes complicated whenever the biological parents are alive.

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The pain of love is the pain of being alive. It is a perpetual wound.

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I have tried to resign myself, and to console myself; and that, I hope, I may have done imperfectly; but what I cannot firmly settle in my mind is, that the end will absolutely come. I hold her hand in mine, I hold her heart in mine, I see her love for me, alive in all its strength. I cannot…

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