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We are linked by blood, and blood is memory without language.
Joyce Carol Oates
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Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote suggests that familial connections transcend verbal communication and are deeply rooted in shared experiences and memories.

Joyce Carol Oates' quote highlights the profound ties that bind family members together through familial blood relations. It emphasizes that these connections are not merely about shared language or verbal expressions but rather about a deeper, instinctual bond formed through shared memories and experiences that shape one’s identity and sense of belonging.

Themes

BloodMemoryFamilyRelationshipsConnections

In practice

Example use cases

In a speech about the importance of family at a community event.

More from Joyce Carol Oates

Of the widow's countless death-duties there is really just one that matters: on the first anniversary of her husband's death the widow should think I kept myself alive.
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I never really knew I wanted to 'be' a writer, but I was always writing from a very young age. It became more conscious as an ideal when I was in my twenties.
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I'm drawn to write about upstate New York in the way in which a dreamer might have recurring dreams. My childhood and girlhood were spent in upstate New York, in the country north of Buffalo and West of Rochester. So this part of New York state is very familiar to me and, with its economic difficulties, has become emblematic of much of American life.
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My writing is often a way of 'bearing witness' for others who lack the education and the opportunity to tell their own stories, so I hope that my writing won't be affected too much by my personal life.
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The worst cynicism: a belief in luck.
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. . . there is a wish in the heart of mankind to be distracted and confused. Truth is but one attraction, and not always the most powerful.
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