Do all lovers feel helpless and valiant in the presence of the beloved? Helpless because the need to roll over like a pet dog is never far away. Valiant because you know you would slay a dragon with a pocket knife if you had to. Jeanette Winterson More Quotes by Jeanette Winterson More Quotes From Jeanette Winterson The curious are always in some danger. If you are curious you might never come home. Jeanette Winterson literature home might Although wherever you are going is always in front of you, there is no such thing as straight ahead. Jeanette Winterson wherever-you-are fronts I go on writing so that I will always have something to read. Jeanette Winterson goes-on writing What you risk reveals what you value. Jeanette Winterson take-a-chance risk literature Lovers are not at their best when it matters. Mouths dry up, palms sweat, conversation flags and all the time the heart is threatening to fly from the body once and for all. Lovers have been known to have heart attacks. Lovers drink too much from nervousness and cannot perform. They eat too little and faint during their fervently wished consummation. They do not stroke the favoured cat and their face-paint comes loose. This is not all. Whatever you have set store by, your dress, your dinner, your poetry, will go wrong. Jeanette Winterson dry-up cat heart Earth is ancient now, but all knowledge is stored up in her. She keeps a record of everything that has happened since time began. Of time before time, she says little, and in a language that no one has yet understood. Through time, her secret codes have gradually been broken. Her mud and lava is a message from the past. Of time to come, she says much, but who listens? Jeanette Winterson broken secret past There are many forms of love and affection, some people can spend their whole lives together without knowing each other's names. Naming is a difficult and time-consuming process; it concerns essences, and it means power. But on the wild nights who can call you home? Only the one who knows your name. Jeanette Winterson home night mean I don't know which is worse: to be wrongfully accused or mistakenly understood. Jeanette Winterson accused understood knows Whatever it is that pulls the pin, that hurls you past the boundaries of your own life into a brief and total beauty, even for a moment, it is enough. Jeanette Winterson moments boundaries past The continuous narrative of existence is a lie. There is no continuous narrative, there are lit-up moments, and the rest is dark. Jeanette Winterson narrative dark lying When we make a change, it's so easy to interpret our unsettledness as unhappiness, and our unhappiness as a result of having made the wrong decision. Our mental and emotional states fluctuate madly when we make big changes in our lives, and some days we could tight-rope across Manhattan, and other days we are too weary to clean our teeth. This is normal. This is natural. This is change. Jeanette Winterson teeth emotional decision unhappy families are conspiracies of silence. The one who breaks the silence is never forgiven. Jeanette Winterson family silence unhappy If I can't stay where I am, and I can't, then I will put all that I can into the going. Jeanette Winterson i-can ifs The journey is not linear, it is always back and forth, denying the calendar, the wrinkles and lines of the body. Jeanette Winterson calendars wrinkles journey Writing is both bomb and bomb disposal-a necessary shattering of cliche and assumption, and a powerful defusing of the soul-destroying messages of modern life (that nothing matters, nothing changes, money is everything, etc). Writing is a state of being as well as an act of doing. Jeanette Winterson powerful soul writing I think men can really get in the way when you are trying to sort your life out and get on with it. Because they just take up so much space. I'm not under any illusions that I could have been where I am now in literary terms if I had been heterosexual. I really believe I would not be. Jeanette Winterson men believe thinking Every believer is an anarchist at heart. True believers would rather see governments topple and history rewritten than scuff the cover of their faith. Jeanette Winterson government faith heart Book collecting is an obsession, an occupation, a disease, an addiction, a fascination, an absurdity, a fate. It is not a hobby. Those who do it must do it. Jeanette Winterson addiction fate book What I want does exist if I dare to find it. Jeanette Winterson dare doe want I am a writer who happens to love women. I am not a lesbian who happens to write. Jeanette Winterson happens writing love
