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When he was three years old Jackie ran into the house crying. I asked, "What's happened? What's wrong?" He showed me his bleeding hand - the palm of his hand had been scraped. "How did you do that? It isn't bad! Did you hurt it on something dirty?" I patted the blood away with a tissue. He stopped crying; he pressed against me with his wet face. My husband said, coming into the kitchen, "Let's see what happened -" He took Jackie's hand and ..
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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She was standing with her thin arms lifted in a pose of crucifixion as the white satin gown with its myriad pearl buttons, tucks and pleats and ingenious lace trim, was fitted onto her like an exquisite straitjacket. Mrs. Littrell had insisted upon the corset, Ariah could scarcely breathe. I take thee Gilbert. My lawfully wedded husband. A sneeze would have shattered the corset, and the wedding. At police headquarters, the bride of the "fal..
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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You don't understand! Gilbert turned his back on me, but he wouldn't have turned his back on God." Ariah"
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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You keep asking me that," she said sharply. "No. I don't care to notify anyone. I can't bear a crowd of relatives around me. I threw away that damned corset in a trash can. I won't return to that." There"
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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REGINALD BURNABY THE GREAT (variously identified as a defrocked Roman Catholic priest from Galway, an ex-convict from Liverpool, if not an escaped convict from that seaport city)
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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It had given him a charge of entitlement and invincibility he would draw upon through life, like a limitless bank account.)
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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72473a4
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Silence has gathered around me like a thick, viscous water filling in a muddy footprint. Early evening, swollen sky like an eye that
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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He'd never risk his life if he could avoid it. "I'd rather live, thank you." In"
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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73e3773
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One thing it was not: love at first sight. He didn't believe in such. He wasn't a believer in romance, sentimental coincidences, "meanings" snatched out of the air. He certainly didn't believe in destiny, he was a gambler by nature and you know that destiny is just chance you try to manipulate for your own profit. Yet"
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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b37a5c5
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Mrs. Erskine struck him as fierce and plain and haughty as one of those straight-backed red-haired girl-women in certain of the watercolors of Winslow Homer.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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37c2feb
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the mirror above the bureau--a flushed blurred face. I had learned to look quickly away from that face for so often I hated what I saw.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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and much more interesting.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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de69392
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if a man hurts you, and you show that hurt, and your eyes lock with his, he will never forgive you. For always you will be the girl he has hurt, which means you are the girl he can always hurt again. Mr.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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bc1714f
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Nothing is more lonely than fucking 'good works.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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e93e587
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The worst cynicism: a belief in luck.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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10f877f
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Our enemy is by tradition our savior, in preventing us from superficiality.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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e778a5f
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If food is poetry, is not poetry also food?
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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f77a3e7
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Constant interruptions are the destruction of imagination.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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Boxing has become America's tragic theater.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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To be knocked out doesn't mean what it seems. A boxer does not have to get up.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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a94a9da
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The] third man in the ring makes boxing possible.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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0542211
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Love commingled with hate is more powerful than love. Or hate.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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7c450a4
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It's one of those secrets that's embarrassing to acknowledge, but we do love our students.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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effae39
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Very few writers of distinction in fact were outstanding as undergraduates.
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Joyce Carol Oates |
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f1c49aa
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The writer is a "somewhat mystical" -- or do I mean "mythical"? -- person.
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Joyce Carol Oates |