Critical Reading Quotes

“[T]he idea that some of us can simply opt out of politics—the idea that politics is something one chooses as a vocation, rather than something we have whether we choose it or not; something that encompasses the inevitable material realities that shape every atom of our lives: where we live, how we work, our relationship to justice—is a fantasy of epic proportions. This kind of nonpolitical storytelling—and the stunted readership it demands—asks us to uphold the lie that certain bodies, certain characters, certain stories, remain depoliticized, neutral, and universal.”
― Elaine Castillo, How to Read Now

“I can critique the bad; I can take the good, and I can add whatever I want.”
― Justine Larbalestier

“Historical periodization always tells a story. It is a narrative device for putting meaning into the flux of historical process - creating protagonists, heroes, pace, and plot. For this reason, the division of history into periods always carries an ideological load, and it is a methodological imperative to approach questions of broad historical periodization with this in mind.”
― James Ferguson

“...Being simply illustrations, of how each of us reads, becomes engaged in and watches what is being read all at the same time.”
― Toni Morrison, Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination