Educated A Memoir Quotes & Sayings

Realism is for lazy-minded, semi-educated people whose atrophied imagination allows them to appreciate only the most limited and convention subject matter. Re-Fi is a repetitive genre written by unimaginative hacks who rely on mere mimesis. If they had any self-respect they'd be writing memoir, but they're too lazy to fact-check. Of course I never read Re-Fi. But the kids keep bringing home these garish realistic novels and talking about them, so I know that it's an incredibly narrow genre, completely centered on one species, full of worn-out cliches and predictable situations--the quest for the father, mother-bashing, obsessive male lust, dysfunctional suburban families, etc., etc. All it's good for is being made into mass-market movies. Given its old-fashioned means and limited subject matter, realism is quite incapable of describing the complexity of contemporary experience. — Ursula K. Le Guin

On a spectrum of literary productions, memoir is just another form. If the person doing the reviewing or critiquing was ill-educated about literary forms, they could write something dunderheaded about the author or their life (I've seen these and barfed at them), but anyone who is well-practiced and educated in literature - why would they leave that at the door when entering memoir? — Lidia Yuknavitch

Imagery is the most important to me when singing stories. I try to paint pictures with the words and decorate with little to no singing ... let the song do the work. — Shelby Lynne

A recently reprinted memoir by Frederick Douglass has footnotes explaining what words like 'arraigned,' 'curried' and 'exculpate' meant, and explaining who Job was. In other words, this man who was born a slave and never went to school educated himself to the point where his words now have to be explained to today's expensively under-educated generation. — Thomas Sowell

Chemical waste products are the droppings of science. — Lewis Thomas

All paintings start out of a mood, out of a relationship with things or people, out of a complete visual impression — Richard Diebenkorn

Uncertainty hurts business. It annoys individuals. Why keep the whole country, including business and individuals, in uncertainty over the extent of the tax burdens to be placed upon us? How many of those who voted for Calvin Coolidge imagined for a moment that would do nothing to bring about tax relief before 1926? ... But if the Administration persists in opposing a special session then it will inevitably be 1926 before action is taken ... Coolidge and Congress should ease our minds and grease our activities by reforming and reducing taxation as soon as feasible after March 4. — B.C. Forbes

There is no dogma that the organ or harmonium can be used in church, but not the drum. — Francis Arinze