Joyce Maynard quotes | Thousands Of Quotes

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The portrait of my parents is a complicated one, but lovingly drawn.

The painter who feels obligated to depict his subjects as uniformly beautiful or handsome and without flaws will fall short of making art.

Teach a child to play solitaire, and she'll be able to entertain herself when there's no one around. Teach her tennis, and she'll know what to do when she's on a court. But raise her to feel comfortable in nature, and the whole planet is her home.

Some literary types subscribe to the notion that being a writer like Salinger entitles a person to remain free of the standards that might apply to mere mortals.

Not only did I avoid speaking of Salinger; I resisted thinking about him. I did not reread his letters to me. The experience had been too painful.

My job is writing. I get paid to do it. When was the last time you heard someone challenge a doctor for making money off of cancer?

Many women my age have known the experience of giving up crucial parts of themselves to please the man they love.

Women writers have been told, forever, that our stories were not valuable. Not as valuable as men's stories about wars, business, power.

Nothing like being visible, publishing one's work, and speaking openly about one's life, to disabuse the world of the illusion of one's perfection and purity.