Cat Quote by Shirley Jackson

“All cat stories start with this statement: "My mother, who was the first cat, told me this...”

Shirley Jackson

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More by Shirley Jackson

I can't help it when people are frightened," says Merricat. "I always want to frighten them more.

Shirley Jackson

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“She could not remember ever being truly happy in her adult life; her years with her mother had been built up devotedly around small guilts and small reproaches, constant weariness, and unending despair. Without ever wanting to become reserved and shy, she had spent so long alone, with no one to love, that it was difficult for her to talk,…

Shirley Jackson

“Upstairs Margaret said abruptly, 'I suppose it starts to happen first in the suburbs,' and when Brad said, 'What starts to happen?' she said…

Shirley Jackson

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“The beautiful clarity of all marked outlines occurred to her--there would be a deep satisfaction in strengthening fences, for instance, going along on the…

Shirley Jackson

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“And we held each other in the dark hall and laughed, with the tears running down our cheeks and echoes of our laughter going…

Shirley Jackson

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“Why do people want to talk to each other? I mean, what are the things people always want to find out about other people?”

Shirley Jackson

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Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of…

Shirley Jackson

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“It was as though the people needed the ugliness of the village, and fed on it. The houses and the stores seemed to have…

Shirley Jackson

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“Eleanor—“I plan to stay up and read for a while.” “Are you still reading Pamela?” Eleanor asked the doctor. “Volume two. I have three…

Shirley Jackson

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“Is everyone really crazy but me?”

Shirley Jackson

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February, when the days of winter seem endless and no amount of wistful recollecting can bring back any air of summer.

Shirley Jackson

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“it’s quite a hazard, quite a hazard indeed, people knocking you down. Still, it’s a genuine pleasure to find one as willing as you…

Shirley Jackson

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Explore all 224 Shirley Jackson quotes

More Cat quotes

That's the great secret of creativity. You treat ideas like cats: you make them follow you.

Ray Bradbury

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Okay, so I'll admit I'm curious. Big deal. We both know what that leads to. Dead cat.

Susan Elizabeth Phillips

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Most people are sensitized to animals through their cats and dogs, but for me it was a flounder. I used to go fishing with…

Dan Mathews

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One reason why my memory decays is that I have three cats, all so loving and insistent that they play cat's-cradle with every train…

Sylvia Townsend Warner

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It's an interesting fact that fewer than 17 % of Real cats end their lives with the same name they started with. Much family…

Terry Pratchett

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The dog is guided by kindly instinct to the man or woman whose heart is open to his advances. The cat often leaves the…

Agnes Repplier

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If you ask me to tell you anything about the nature of what lies beyond the phaneron… my answer is “How should I know?”……

Martin Gardner

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Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou ow'st the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the…

William Shakespeare

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One cat just leads to another. The place is so damned big it doesn't really seem as though there were many cats until you…

Ernest Hemingway

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In the olden days in England, you could be hung for stealing a sheep or a loaf of bread. However, if a sheep stole a loaf of bread and gave it to you, you would only be tried for receiving, a crime punishable by forty lashes with the cat or the dog, whichever was handy. If you stole a dog…

Mike Harding