1) "Some families will have lost everything but will be entitled to nothing, while others have the further indignity of having to continue repaying loans taken out on properties which no longer exist."
Telegraph.co.uk reporting on the tsunami/earthquake disaster in Japan. This is beyond comprehension to me, but I suppose corporations have lost a great deal of investments, too. I have to remind myself that, working in corporations that could also go under due to lost assets, are individuals and families. Still, you'd think after such a devastation, there would be a little clemency regarding loans. It made me think, perhaps bizarrely, of whether or not my novel is dealing with its own scenario of destruction with as much realism as possible. I have to be careful not to write a planet of hats, so to speak. Not everyone's loss is the same, nor do they all deal with the loss the same, nor will people ostensibly in the same "class" all have access to the same resources and for the same reasons. (I feel weird taking notes for my writing from an article like that, but it jumped out at me for some reason.)
2) Ursula K. Le Guin, regarding the theory that the only good sentence is a short sentence: "This is true for convicted criminals."
I love her. That's all. And a good reminder to me to not use an excessive amount of short sentences, which is a pattern I sometimes fall into for the rhythm of the story. Rhythm is good; short sentences over and over without end or emphasis are bad. In fact, they lose emphasis the more they're used. I get that, and I can only try to do better from now on.
3) "She would of been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shot her every minute of her life."
I can't argue with the sentiment when it comes to this particular granny, although I'm not sure she was actually any better at the end than she was at the beginning. That said, the reflection of the times in this line, specifically reflecting the casual mistreatment of women that was prevalent even in men who weren't killers, is what stands out the most to me. That it still happens all over the world, and that I work with men who would nod their heads, smiling, at this sentiment and think women overreact to it, makes me distinctly sick.
4) "Hey. Good evening. It's been real."
Eric Smith was continuously quotable throughout his Soup Kitchen reading, but I particularly liked the casual expressions of "Hey," rounding out the reading. For fear of going on too long about him and Katy Gunn, I'll just cut it off here and save the rest for my report on the Soup Kitchen reading. Short & sweet: they were amazing. They made me (very slightly) less afraid to read my own work aloud.
5) "Before the starry threshold of Jove's Court
My mansion is."
"Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot
Which men call earth."
John Milton
This quote was in my Astronomy text, and I just love it. I love all things that make me feel the vastness of the universe compared to us and the fluidity of time and space. It makes me feel that we can never know what it's all about or how or why, and that's an incredible feeling. It's so much more exciting to me to feel that I'm part of the universe, just another part, rather than to think that humans are all that and then some, because that would speak poorly of the universe, if true.
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