“Biology gives you a brain. Life turns it into a mind.”
Author detail
Eugenides is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and short story writer.
Quotes
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“Biology gives you a brain. Life turns it into a mind.”
“A love story can never be about full possession. The happy marriage, the requited love, the desire that never dims--these are lucky eventualites but they aren't love stories. Love stories de...”
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“There was nowhere I could go that wouldn't be you.”
“In the end, it wasn't death that surprised her but the stubbornness of life.”
“Yes, you need a passport to prove to the world that you exist. The people at passport control, they cannot look at you and see you are a person. No! They have to look at a little photograph...”
“It was amazing how it worked: the tiniest bit of truth made credible the greatest lies.”
“O Earth, lie heavily upon her eyes; Seal her sweet eyes weary of watching Earth; Lie close around her; leave no room for mirth With its harsh laughter, nor for sound of sighs. She hath no qu...”
“She thought a writer should work harder writing a book than she did reading it.”
“The last thing the hockey ball symbolized was Time itself, the unstoppability of it, the way we're chained to our bodies, which are chained to Time.”
“But maybe they understood more about life than I did. From an early age they knew what little value the world placed in books, and so didn't waste their time with them. Whereas I, even now,...”
“Reading a novel after reading semiotic theory was like jogging empty-handed after jogging with hand weights. What exquisite guilt she felt, wickedly enjoying narrative! Madeleine felt safe w...”
“I know that attaching memories to books may be going out of the world, but while it lasts, it's a strong record of your life.”
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“I had a briefcase at one point, but it was a kind of 1980s New Wave briefcase. It was made of some kind of cardboard and it had metal hinges. It was kind of faux industrial looking, and I us...”
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“Some Pulitzer winners - novelists - have confided to me that getting the prize screwed them up. It messed with their heads. That hasn't been my experience.”
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“I approach writing female characters the same why I approach writing male characters. I never think I'm writing about women, I think I'm writing about one woman, one person. And I try to ima...”
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“I think the suicides in my first book came from the idea of growing up in Detroit. If you grow up in a city like that you feel everything is perishing, evanescent and going away very quickly...”
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“If you talk to geneticists they are constantly finding that your genes are being switched on and off because of the environment. Genes alone do not determine an exact path in your life.”
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“Jacques Derrida is a very important thinker and philosopher who has made serious contributions to both philosophy and literary criticism. Roland Barthes is the one I feel most affinity for,...”
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“At the same time, it's a family story and more of an epic. I needed the third-person. I tried to give a sense that Cal, in writing his story, is perhaps inventing his past as much as recalli...”
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