148 Quotes by Anne Enright

People think motherhood involves a lot of domestic labor, and it doesn’t. It involves being nice to your children as often as possible. That’s part of my trick. I don’t have that anxiety about meeting their needs.

And what amazes me as I hit the motorway is not the fact that everyone loses someone, but that everyone loves someone. It seems like such a massive waste of energy – and we all do it, all the people beetling along between the white lines, merging, converging, overtaking. We each love someone, even though they will die. And we keep loving them, even when they are not there to love any more. And there is no logic or use to any of this, that I can see.

There is nothing as tentative as an old woman’s touch; as loving or as horrible.

Of course I am bland, she thought. You too would be bland if you grew up with one gas pump in front of the house and nothing else except a view that stretched over half the world. Landscape made me bland, bears poking in the garbage can stunted my individuality, as did plagues of horseflies, permafrost, wild-fire, and the sun setting like a bomb. So much sky makes one bewildered – which is the proper way to be.

But was talking aloud allowed?

I have been falling for months. I have been falling into my own life, for months. And I am about to hit it now.

One of the reasons I write is I like being surprised.

I do wish I could write like some of the American women, who can be clever and heartfelt and hopeful; people like Lorrie Moore and Jennifer Egan. But Ireland messed me up too much, I think, so I can’t.

There were eleven months between me and Liam. We came out of her on each other’s tails; one after the other, as fast as a gang-bang, as fast as an infidelity.