Maria Hummel > Quotes

“There’s a large class of men who can’t endure humor in a woman.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“We ride the blades again
beside the crooked bay. You smile.
I hold you like a hole holds light.

We wear our hats and ride the knives.
They cannot fix you. They try and try.
Tunnel! Into the dark open we go.
Days you are sick, we get dressed slow.”
― Maria Hummel

“Not all back-looking is nostalgia,” I said. “Sometimes it’s selfexamination.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“Permission to suffer could only be granted to the most injured. So I kept my weeping to myself, where it festered and spread until i felt like i was two people-”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“Only women who seek their own importance leave her circle of family and friends.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“it would expose us, it would expose most women’s oppressive anxiety about our ultimate vulnerability, a fear both rational and irrational, like the fear of the footsteps behind you at night, magnified a hundred times.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“there is an end for women worse than death.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“But it’s an unpretentious life, and it’s mine.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“The dream of a city in a valley of paradise, flanked by the sea. It was the mapmaker’s gift to render both the existence of L.A. and its possibility, at the end of the world.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“once. “Or I won’t grow up.” “You don’t need books to grow up,” his father said. “Follow your heart.” Hans didn’t understand what to make of that advice. How could he know”
― Maria Hummel, Motherland

“but every fellow she meets has some fatal flaw. Humming when he drives. Absolutely silent in bed. Never heard of the Dead Milkmen. Mispronounces Ed Ruscha’s last name. Bad teeth. Too-perfect teeth. Doesn’t know the meaning of ennui. Yegina needs a guy who gets her, and that’s hard to find. There’s a large class of men who can’t endure humor in a woman.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“kept her eyes”
― Maria Hummel, Motherland

“Well, what if the liberated woman is one of our society's luxuries? And what if she's something hunted and killed, too?" I can't keep the edge from my voice. I can't get Roseann Quinn's headlines from my brain, or the staring eyes of Kitty Genovese. I won't forget Jayme leaving an early 'Still Lives' planning meeting, a queasy look on her face; or Evie's confession that she couldn't sleep after checking all the captions for the catalog's graphic photos. I suppose we knew what was coming with 'Still Lives' - it would expose us, it would expose most women's oppressive anxiety about our ultimate vulnerability, a fear both rational and irrational, like the fear of footsteps behind you at night, magnified a hundred times. But we suppressed our dread in the excitement of a successful show.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“lamb. My aunt used to make a wonderful lamb in sour cream.” Uta turned away from the window, her mouth compressed to a line. “Even a little liver, instead of all this gristle and bone,” Liesl said lightly. “Frau Hefter, how does she feed six children?” When Uta didn’t answer a second time, Liesl set Jürgen down on the floor with some metal spoons. “I’m trying, you know,” she half shouted. To hide her tears, she thundered downstairs and all the way outside. She passed Hans and Ani, both watching the horse with wary, worshipful faces.”
― Maria Hummel, Motherland

“The impossibilities rise around me, steep and sheer. But I think of the hero of Fitzgerald’s last novel, Monroe Stahr, flying over the highest mountains and talking to his pilot about the old railroad men and how they had to lay a track through anyway. You can’t test the best way—except by doing it. So you just do it … You choose some way for no reason at all.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“Do you understand that the entire Development department will spontaneously combust if their Gala honoree doesn’t appear on time?” She smiles at me brightly.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“...let the dead go. The dead already know their ending.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“Santa Monica is what I once naïvely pictured all of Los Angeles would be: the palm trees, indoor-outdoor restaurants, views of the ocean, trim green parks. Temperatures sway gently between warm and cool; the air is either muzzy or sparkly. Attractive people lead their Weimaraners on leather leashes.”
― Maria Hummel, Still Lives

“She reached for her cup, then a soup pan, pouring the coffee back. It was silly to warm it again, but all morning she’d longed for one hot sip, almost burning. For the heat and the sour bitterness to fill her mouth. To taste the quiet, simple mornings before her marriage, when she’d sat by the window of her room at the spa, lonely, but full of hope and purpose.”
― Maria Hummel, Motherland