For me, the short story is the depth of a novel, the breadth of a poem, and, as you come to the last few paragraphs, the experience of surprise.
We protected America from what happened, like a man takes care of his wife. The man doesn’t mind when she closes her eyes at the scary part of the ride, of the movie. He loves her for that sweet, willful ignorance. She gives him something to protect, a nice world in which bad things don’t happen. It’s a pleasure, and a relief, to keep that ignorance intact, even as it comes between them.
Carny people’d punch you in the face before they’d let you tell them your troubles and strangle their own selves before they’d tell you theirs.
We love the attentiveness of powerful people, because it’s such a pleasant, gratifying surprise, but Eleanor was not a grand light shining briefly on the lucky little people. She reached for the soul of everyone who spoke to her, every day. She bowed her head toward yours, as if there was nothing but the time and necessary space for two people to briefly love each other.
The function of democratic living is not to lower standards but to raise those that have been too low.
We were determined to be the people we wanted to be and not the blind, desperate people we were.
Mrs. Vandor said, with her eyes closed, I wouldn’t make that kind of thing a habit. One wishes to be useful, but not indispensably so.
The greatest struggle in my life is between a dignified silence and having my say.
When I read that I thought, I am almost fifty years old and the rest of my life will be love and loss, and when I look down the road, I see a fat old woman and her dog, is what I see.
I couldn’t ask her anything. There wasn’t a single question to which I’d get the answer I wanted.
AB: It’s a great gift. It was the training: to listen, to observe. Those skills are very much what you need as a writer. Keep your mouth shut and see what’s happening around you. Don’t finish people’s sentences for them. Don’t just hear what they say, but also how they behave while they’re saying it. That was great training for writing.
Criticism is like pain. It’s not fun but if it doesn’t hurt, no one pays attention.
We had agreed that “in love” had burned out after four years for us, the way it does for most of us, in two months or two years and, I guess, never for some lucky people. Instead of a trail of fire roaring through, those people get small candles steadily lighting the way home until death do they part, and only the young are stupid enough to think that those two old people, him gimping, her squinting, are not in love.
Scenes are alluded to but not always witnessed – because in life, one sometimes arrives late, or not at all, to the big scene, even though one feels its aftershocks for years. Conversations are overheard, but not always completely understood, and sometimes, even the eavesdropping must be abruptly curtailed – as in life.
His charm and cheer blinded you, made you deaf to your own thoughts, until all you could do was nod and smile, while the frost came down, killing you where you stood.
She insulted conservatives and cowards every time she opened her mouth.
There are people you always love, no matter what they have done to you, no matter what you have done to them.
I got by. I lived amputated, which sounds worse than it felt. I learned to do all kinds of large and small tasks, with part of me missing, and I feel pretty sure that the people who watched me in the world thought I was entirely able-bodied.
I don’t want to end my life, he said, but I’d rather end it while I am still myself, rather than become less and less of a person.
But I know who you should be with. You should be with a guy who doesn’t mind that you’re smarter than he is, who doesn’t mind that most of the time, you’ll be the main event. You need to be with a guy who supports how hard you work and who’ll bring you a cup of coffee late at night.
We’re not here for a long time, we’re here for a good time.