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.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
And that's the insult of it, how always it comes back to a woman being a "good" mother in the world's eyes or a "bad" mother, how everything in a woman's life is funneled through her body between her legs.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote critiques societal expectations placed on women regarding motherhood and sexuality.
Joyce Carol Oates highlights the perception that a woman's worth is often evaluated through her role as a mother, subjecting her identity to societal judgment based on whether she is deemed a 'good' or 'bad' mother. This reflects a broader issue of how women's lives and choices are often scrutinized and limited by cultural norms that prioritize their reproductive roles over their individuality and autonomy.
Themes
MotherhoodSocietyJudgmentWomenIdentity
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about women's rights, this quote can illustrate the pressures mothers face.
More from Joyce Carol Oates
All quotes →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.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
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.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
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.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
The worst cynicism: a belief in luck.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
. . . 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.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
Similar quotes
You’re lost in your own world, in the things that happen there, and you’ve locked all the doors. Sometimes I look at you sleeping. I wake up and look at you and I feel closer to you when you’re like that, unguarded, than when you’re awake. When you’re awake you’re like someone with her eyes closed, watching a movie on the inside of your eyelids. I can’t reach you anymore. Once upon a time I could, but not now, and not for a long time.
Nicole KraussRead
Given the historical power differential between blacks and whites, blacks are required to be attentive to the way their white counterparts see themselves in relation to people of color if they want to survive and even thrive.
James A. ForbesRead
Respect your fellow human being, treat them fairly, disagree with them honestly, enjoy their friendship, explore your thoughts about one another candidly, work together for a common goal and help one another achieve it. No destructive lies. No ridiculous fears. No debilitating anger.
Bill BradleyRead
And yet, standing behind her son, waiting for the traffic light change, she remembered how in the midst of it all there had been a time when she'd felt a loneliness so deep that once, not so many years ago, having a cavity filled, the dentist's gentle turning of her chin with his soft fingers had felt to her like a tender kindness of almost excruciating depth, and she had swallowed with a groan of longing, tears springing to her eyes.
Elizabeth StroutRead
She will look at you as women look at men, and she will judge you as a woman judge men, not on the strength of their arguments, and not in their cleverness or prowess in battle, but rather on the force of their character, the intensity of their passion, their strength of soul, their compassion, and... ah, this above all... their conversation.
Orson Scott CardRead
We think constant connection will make us feel less lonely. The opposite is true.
Sherry TurkleRead