Barbara Kingsolver Quotes - Page 13

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• You know what the issue is? Do you want to know? It's what these guys have decided to call America. They have the audacity to say, 'There, you sons of bitches, don't lay a finger on it. That is a finished product.'" "But any country is still in the making. Always. That's just history, people have to see that.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Country, Son, America

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• I can count all the ways in which being a mother has enriched my understanding of the world, of character, my sense of the future and my attachment to it. I can't imagine what kind of writer I'd be if I didn't have my kids.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Mother, Character, Kids

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• I used to think religion was just more of the same thing. Dump responsibility on the big guy. Now I see an importance in that. It's a relief to accept that not everything is under your control.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Responsibility, Thinking, Guy

  "Among the wild things" by Suzie Mackenzie, www.theguardian.com. November 17, 2000.

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• Being a novelist and being a mother have exactly coincided in my life: the call from my agent saying that I had a contract for my first novel - that was on my answering phone message when I got back from the hospital with my first child.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Mother, Children, Phones

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• No other continent has endured such an unspeakably bizarre combination of foreign thievery and foreign goodwill.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Bizarre, Thievery, Combination

  Barbara Kingsolver (2008). “The Poisonwood Bible”, p.437, Faber & Faber

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• I know I'm a rare person, a trained scientist who writes fiction, because so few contemporary novelists engage with science.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Writing, Rare Person, Novelists

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• People's dreams are made out of what they do all day. The same way a dog that runs after rabbits will dream of rabbits. It's what you do that makes your soul, not the other way around.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Running, Dream, Dog

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• she's never forgotten, either, how a mystery caught in the hand could lose its grace

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Hands, Grace, Mystery

  Barbara Kingsolver (2008). “Prodigal Summer”, p.59, Faber & Faber

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• It takes some courage to write fiction about politically controversial topics. The dread is you'll be labeled a political writer.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Writing, Controversial Topics, Political

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• There are always more questions. Science as a process is never complete. It is not a foot race, with a finish line.... People will always be waiting at a particular finish line: journalists with their cameras, impatient crowds eager to call the race, astounded to see the scientists approach, pass the mark, and keep running. It's a common misunderstanding, he said. They conclude there was no race. As long as we won't commit to knowing everything, the presumption is we know nothing.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Running, Race, Knowing Everything

  4 Copy quote

• Literature sucks you into another psyche. So the creation of empathy necessarily influences how you'll behave to other people.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  People, Empathy, Literature

  "A life in writing" by Maya Jaggi, www.theguardian.com. June 11, 2010.

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• The thing is, it's my own fault. I just can't put up with a person that won't go out of his way for me. And that's what a man is. Somebody that won't go out of his way for you. I bet it says that in the dictionary.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Men, Way, Faults

  Barbara Kingsolver (2011). “Pigs in Heaven”, p.289, Faber & Faber

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• For scientists, reality is not optional.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Reality, Scientist, Optional

  Barbara Kingsolver (2012). “Flight Behaviour”, p.229, Faber & Faber

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• Insomnia’s different,” I said. It was hard to explain this to people. “You know the light that comes on when you open the refrigerator door? Just imagine it stays on all the time, even after you close the door. That’s what it’s like in my head. The light stays on.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Insomnia, Light, Doors

  13 Copy quote

• You could love your crazy people, even admire them, instead of resenting that they're not self-sufficient.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Crazy, Self, People

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• Fiction and essays can create empathy for the theoretical stranger.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Empathy, Fiction, Stranger

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• Science doesn't tell us what we should do. It only tells us what is.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Should

  Barbara Kingsolver (2012). “Flight Behaviour”, p.258, Faber & Faber

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• People love to read about sins and errors, but not their own.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Errors, People, Sin

  Barbara Kingsolver (2009). “The Lacuna”, p.447, Faber & Faber

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• When the scope of the problem seems insuperable, isn't it time to call this one, give it up, and get on with life as we know it. I do know that answer to that one: that's called child abuse. When my teenager worries that her generation won't be able to fix this problem, I have to admit to her that it won't be up to her generation. It's up to mine. This is a now-or-never kind of project.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Children, Teenager, Giving

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• After 'The Poisonwood Bible' was published, several people believed that my parents were missionaries, which could not be further from the truth.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  People, Parent, Missionary

  "Motherhood is so sentimentalised in our culture". Interview with Gemma Kappala-Ramsamy, www.theguardian.com. May 11, 2013.

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• The bad thing about small-town life is that everybody knows your business...I suppose that is my central obsession. What we owe to society, what we owe to ourselves.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Obsession

  "Among the wild things" by Suzie Mackenzie, www.theguardian.com. November 17, 2000.

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• I never think that anything I'm writing is bluntly political in any way. I'm not going for commentary.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Writing, Thinking, Political

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• I live in a rural part of Virginia surrounded by farms and farmers.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Virginia, Farmers, Farms

  "Barbara Kingsolver Sets a Fire". Interview With Royal Young, www.interviewmagazine.com. November 7, 2012.

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• Mistakes wreck your life. But they make what you have. It's kind of all one. You know what Hester told me when we were working the sheep one time? She said it's no good to complain about your flock, because it's the put-together of all your past choices.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Mistake, Past, Sheep

  Barbara Kingsolver (2012). “Flight Behaviour”, p.308, Faber & Faber

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• I did it to win love, and to prove myself capable. Not to move mountains. In my opinions, mountains don't move. They only look changed when you look down on them from great height.

  Barbara Kingsolver

  Moving, Winning, Mountain

  Barbara Kingsolver (2009). “Animal Dreams: A Novel”, p.36, Harper Collins

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