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Mary Steichen Calderone: We are still...

Mary Steichen Calderone: We are still...

We are still a sexophobic society, afraid of the wrong things for the wrong reasons.

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Mary McCarthy: Every age has...

Mary McCarthy: Every age has...

Every age has a keyhole to which its eye is pasted.

Source: On the Contrary, pt. 1,...

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Gloria Naylor: Not only is...

Gloria Naylor: Not only is...

Not only is your story worth telling, but it can be told in words so painstakingly eloquent that it becomes a...

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Olive Schreiner: [Finishing schools] are...

Olive Schreiner: [Finishing schools] are...

[Finishing schools] are nicely adapted machines for experimenting on the question, Into how little space a human...

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Enid Bagnold: Judges don't age....

Enid Bagnold: Judges don't age....

Judges don't age. Time decorates them.

Source: Judge, in The Chalk Garden, act...

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Pearl Buck: I don't wait...

Pearl Buck: I don't wait...

I don't wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to...

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Annie Dillard: I don't know...

Annie Dillard: I don't know...

I don't know what it is about fecundity that so appalls. I suppose it is the teeming evidence that birth and growth,...

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Ivy Compton-Burnett: There is probably...

Ivy Compton-Burnett: There is probably...

There is probably nothing like living together for blinding people to each other.

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Erica Jong: And the trouble...

Erica Jong: And the trouble...

And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.

Source: In...

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Nora Ephron: I always read...

Nora Ephron: I always read...

I always read the last page of a book first so that if I die before I finish I'll know how it turned...

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Rachel Field: I used to...

Rachel Field: I used to...

I used to think I had ambition . . . but now I'm not so sure. It may have been only discontent. They're easily...

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Edna Ferber: Only amateurs say...

Edna Ferber: Only amateurs say...

Only amateurs say that they write for their own amusement. Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination...

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Lisa Alther: That's the risk...

Lisa Alther: That's the risk...

That's the risk you take if you change: that people you've been involved with won't like the new you. But other...

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Joyce Carol Oates: Our house is...

Joyce Carol Oates: Our house is...

Our house is made of glass . . . and our lives are made of glass; and there is nothing we can do to protect...

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Jean Stafford: From time to...

Jean Stafford: From time to...

From time to time, I need a rest from the exercitation of my intellect.

Source: The...

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Toni Cade Bambara: My mother, religious-negro,...

Toni Cade Bambara: My mother, religious-negro,...

My mother, religious-negro, proud of having waded through a storm, is, very obviously a sturdy bridge that I have...

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Toni Cade Bambara: Writing, like dreams,...

Toni Cade Bambara: Writing, like dreams,...

Writing, like dreams, confronts, pushes you up against the evasions, self-deceptions, investments in opinions and...

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Daisy Ashford: My own idear...

Daisy Ashford: My own idear...

My own idear is that these things are as piffle before the wind.

Source: The Earl...

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Francoise Sagan: Jazz music is...

Francoise Sagan: Jazz music is...

Jazz music is an intensified feeling of nonchalance.

Source: Dominique, in A...

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Francoise Sagan: It seems to...

Francoise Sagan: It seems to...

It seems to me that there are two kinds of trickery: the fronts people assume before one another's eyes, and the front...

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