Margaret Atwood Quotes

"...we must be a beacon of hope, because if you tell people there's nothing they can do, they will do worse than nothing."

on Hope

"A voice is a human gift; it should be cherished and used, to utter fully human speech as possible. Powerlessness and silence go together."

on Wisdom

"I remember my mean mouth, I remember how wise I thought I was. But I was not wise then. Now I am wise."

on Wisdom

"Nothing is more difficult than to understand the dead, I've found; but nothing is more dangerous than to ignore them."

on Death

"A word after a word after a word is power."

on Writing

"I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary."

on Love

"Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results."

on Wisdom

"He put his arms around me. We were both feeling miserable. How were we to know we were happy, even then? Because we at least had that: arms, around."

on Love

"A place with no handholds,no landmarks,no past at all:That would have been too much like dying"

on Life

"I would like to be without shame. I would like to be shameless. I would like to be ignorant. Then I would not know how ignorant I was."

on Philosophy

"If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon?"

on Love

"They seemed to be able to choose. We seemed to be able to choose, then. We were a society dying of too much choice."

on Philosophy

"A writer's age at the time of a work's composition is never irrelevant."

on Writing

"Madness is only an amplification of what you already are."

on Psychology

"What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question."

on Life