Beth Hanna

“I am working out the vocabulary of my silence.”
― Muriel Rukeyser

“Always our wars have been our confessions of weakness”
― Muriel Rukeyser, The Life of Poetry

“Lincoln's story confounds those who see depression as a collection of symptoms to be eliminated. But it resonates with those who see suffering as a potential catalyst of emotional growth. "What man actually needs," the psychiatrist Victor Frankl argued,"is not a tension-less state but rather the striving and struggling of a worthwhile goal." Many believe that psychological health comes with the relief of distress. But Frankl proposed that all people-- and particularly those under some emotional weight-- need a purpose that will both draw on their talents and transcend their lives. For Lincoln, this sense of purpose was indeed the key that unlocked the gates of a mental prison. This doesn't mean his suffering went away. In fact, as his life became richer and more satisfying, his melancholy exerted a stronger pull. He now responded to that pull by tying it to his newly defined sense of purpose. From a place of trouble, he looked for meaning. He looked at imperfection and sought redemption.”
― Joshua Wolf Shenk, Lincoln's Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness – The Inner Life and Leadership of Abraham Lincoln

“She’d given up so much and so little when she agreed to marry him, but he has been so fixated on having her that he had rarely stopped to consider what it would mean for her to allow herself to be had.”
― Claire Lombardo, The Most Fun We Ever Had