Mae > Mae's Quotes

“This was love: a string of coincidences that gathered significance and became miracles.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Half of a Yellow Sun

“You must never behave as if your life belongs to a man. Do you hear me?” Aunty Ifeka said. “Your life belongs to you and you alone.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Half of a Yellow Sun

“But race is the child of racism, not the father. And the process of naming “the people” has never been a matter of genealogy and physiognomy so much as one of hierarchy. Difference in hue and hair is old. But the belief in the preeminence of hue and hair, the notion that these factors can correctly organize a society and that they signify deeper attributes, which are indelible—this is the new idea at the heart of these new people who have been brought up hopelessly, tragically, deceitfully, to believe that they are white.”
― Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me

“The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom.”
― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

“Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence?”
― Paolo Freire

“When grown-ups hear a little dark door creaking in their hearts they turn the telly up. They slug a glass of wine. They tell the cat it was just a door creaking. The cat knows. It jumps down from the sofa and walks out of the room. When that little dark door in a heart starts to go click-clack click-clack click-clack click-clack so loudly and violently their chest shows an actual beat - well, then they say they've got bad cholesterol and they try to quit using butter, they begin to go for walks.
When the tiny dark door in her heart creaks open, she will walk right through it.
She will lie down and inside her own heart like a bird in the night.”
― Jenni Fagan, The Sunlight Pilgrims

“You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm.”
― Colette

“Above all, avoid lies, all lies, especially the lie to yourself. Keep watch on your own lie and examine it every hour, every minute. And avoid contempt, both of others and of yourself: what seems bad to you in yourself is purified by the very fact that you have noticed it in yourself. And avoid fear, though fear is simply the consequence of every lie. Never be frightened at your own faintheartedness in attaining love, and meanwhile do not even be very frightened by your own bad acts.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

“Men impose deception on women and punish them for being deceived, force them down to the lowest level and punish them for falling so low, bind them in marriage and then chastise them with menial service for life, or insults, or blows.”
― Nawal El Saadawi, Woman at Point Zero