I felt, that night, on that stage, under that skull, incredibly close to everything in the universe, but also extremely alone. I wondered, for the first time in my life, if life was worth all the work it took to live. What exactly made it
...more
“To have that sense of one’s intrinsic worth which constitutes self-respect is potentially to have everything: the ability to discriminate, to love and to remain indifferent. To lack it is to be locked within oneself, paradoxically incapable of either love or indifference. If we do not respect ourselves, we are the one hand forced to despise those who have so few resources as to consort with us, so little perception as to remain blind to our fatal weaknesses. On the other, we are peculiarly in thrall to everyone we see, curiously determined to live out – since our self-image is untenable – their false notion of us. We flatter ourselves by thinking this compulsion to please others an attractive trait: a gist for imaginative empathy, evidence of our willingness to give. Of course I will play Francesca to your Paolo, Helen Keller to anyone’s Annie Sullivan; no expectation is too misplaced, no role too ludicrous. At the mercy of those we cannot but hold in contempt, we play roles doomed to failure before they are begun, each defeat generating fresh despair at the urgency of divining and meeting the next demand made upon us.”
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“There are times in our lives when we have to realize our past is precisely what it is, and we cannot change it. But we can change the story we tell ourselves about it, and by doing that, we can change the future.”
― The Weird Sisters
― The Weird Sisters
“Nothing's ever the same," she said. "Be it a second later or a hundred years. It's always churning and roiling. And people change as much as oceans.”
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“Grown-ups don't look like grown-ups on the inside either. Outside, they're big and thoughtless and they always know what they're doing. Inside, they look just like they always have. Like they did when they were your age. Truth is, there aren't any grown-ups. Not one, in the whole wide world.”
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“Childhood memories are sometimes covered and obscured beneath the things that come later, like childhood toys forgotten at the bottom of a crammed adult closet, but they are never lost for good.”
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
― The Ocean at the End of the Lane
The Penguin Press
— 1453 members
— last activity Mar 28, 2017 12:09PM
Welcome to our Goodreads Group for The Penguin Press! We like to say that we publish "ideas that matter and storytelling that lasts," and some of our ...more
Wellesley Underground Readers
— 63 members
— last activity Mar 21, 2017 08:12PM
A group for all those readers who love the alternative alumnae magazine, Wellesley Underground! http://wellesleyunderground.com/ 1. Are you a Wellesl ...more
Emily’s 2025 Year in Books
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