A Detroit Anthology Quotes

“I live in a strange city. Here suffering is eloquent. Joy a sudden trauma. Curse words taste delightful.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“This is not an easy city. But it’s the city where I grew up, albeit in my late twenties, long after most people may admit to growing up. I had a lot of growing up to do.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Despite economic indicators, America has an infatuation with building the most advanced sports venues.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“And what can I tell you about Detroit? My city is ripped down the middle. It’s a place that is two parts post-apocalypse and three parts stubborn as hell. A city that keeps running on idealism mixed up with cynicism, covered over by pragmatism and sprinkled with the long-lasting poison of racism. But we still build your cars. We still make your music. We still bottle the best ginger ale in the world and have championship hockey and basketball teams and the only international marathon course in the world and my Tigers.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Try to imagine what it’s like to wake up one morning, like I did recently, to realize your childhood has been boarded up, abandoned, padlocked. It’s a very disorienting feeling.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Here in the Motor City, we take an almost perverse pride in doing things the hard way, or whatever way that means we can be left alone to do our thing however we want.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“no one escaped the city: They brought the city with them.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Henry Ford, the man who famously said, “history is bunk,” spent the last part of his life building an unoccupied historic village without any actual history.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Detroit rose to its greatest height (and fell as far as it did) in part because Henry Ford didn’t want to work too hard.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Now we think maybe Lake Erie is the great water referred to in the I Ching, and if we wait long enough we can walk across—to Buffalo or Cleveland.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Every last one of them, men and women alike, carries the same expression: an undeniable willingness to work, and a confusion as to why they have to fight for the right to support their families.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“Many residents exhort each other to “Keep Portland Weird,” usually via bumper stickers on perfectly normal automobiles.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology

“On the first day of class, I quickly learned that teaching is not all about giving information; it’s about learning and co-creating.”
― Anna Clark, A Detroit Anthology