Sadness is more or less like a head cold - with patience, it passes. Depression is like cancer.
Barbara KingsolverRead
Let me claim that Africa and I kept company for a while and then parted ways as if we were both party to relations with a failed outcome. Or say I was afflicted with Africa like a bout of a rare disease from which I have not managed a full recovery.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects on a complex and perhaps painful relationship with Africa, indicating a sense of loss and unresolved feelings.
In this quote, Barbara Kingsolver communicates the profound emotional ties she formed with Africa, suggesting that her experiences there were significant but ultimately led to a sense of parting or disillusionment. By comparing her connection to Africa to a rare disease, she implies that the impact of her relationship with the continent is enduring and complex, highlighting both the beauty and the struggles of such an engagement.
Themes
AfricaRelationshipJourneyExperienceDisillusionment
In practice
Example use cases
Using this quote in a discussion about the emotional impacts of travel.
More from Barbara Kingsolver
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I'm of a fearsome mind to throw my arms around every living librarian who crosses my path, on behalf of the souls they never knew they saved.
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I did it to win love, and to prove myself capable. Not to move mountains. In my opinions, mountains don't move. They only look changed when you look down on them from great height.
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Memory is a complicated thing, a relative to truth, but not its twin.
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Empathy is really the opposite of spiritual meanness. It's the capacity to understand that every war is both won and lost. And that someone else's pain is as meaningful as your own.
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