Patrick

“If you hate violence and don't believe in politics, the only major remedy remaining is education.”
― George Orwell, A Collection of Essays

“I am afraid! It is not starving I fear, or talking to people, or even being alone. But I cannot bear to be useless and ineffectual. There must be some meaning to me, if not to my life; there must surely be some purpose that has my name written on it. If this is not so, if I am deceiving myself about this too, then why should I want to become real? What reason have I to live anywhere?”
― Peter S. Beagle, A Fine and Private Place

“Literature is not an instruction manual. For obvious reasons, this is rarely noted in fiction.”
― Charles Baxter, Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction

“I had a boyfriend once who sent me--in a plastic bag, so it wouldn't drip--a real cow's heart with a real arrow stuck through it. As you may divine, he knew I was interested in poetry.”
― Margaret Atwood, Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing