The mouth was wide open and ripped at the corners, as though she had choked a little in giving up the tremendous vitality she had stored so long.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the struggle of letting go of one's energy or essence, often indicating a significant loss or sacrifice.
F. Scott Fitzgerald's quote poignantly illustrates a moment of profound transition, where a person, in relinquishing their energy or vitality, experiences a struggle signified by a wide-open mouth and torn corners. This imagery evokes the intensity of release, suggesting that such a surrender may come with difficulty and pain, symbolizing the sacrifices made throughout life.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming obstacles, this quote can emphasize the cost of personal growth.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
We need to confront the life-killing stereotype that says we're all about suffering. We need to bear witness to our pleasures.
Life is a garden. It is an opportunity. You can grow weeds, you can grow roses; it all depends on you.
That's the irony in the work: the best stories are the worst things that happen. My best times were somebody else's worst.
Life is like a trumpet - if you don't put anything into it, you don't get anything out of it.
Most of us enter adult life with great ambitions for how we will start our own ventures, but the harshness of life wears us down. We settle into some job and slowly give in to the illusion that our bosses care about us and our future, that they spend time thinking of our welfare.
Life is a magic vase filled to the brim, so made that you cannot dip from it nor draw from it; but it overflows into the hand that drops treasures into it. Drop in malice and it overflows hate; drop in charity and it overflows love.
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