It seems that fighting is a game where everybody is the loser.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
People can be slave-ships in shoes.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that people can be imprisoned by societal expectations while appearing free.
Zora Neale Hurston's quote highlights the metaphorical bondage that individuals can experience, even when they are outwardly living in a society that claims to value freedom. The 'slave-ships in shoes' imagery implies that people may carry the weight of their struggles and limitations, trapped by cultural norms and economic structures that dictate their lives, thus hindering their true potential and freedoms.
Themes
FreedomBondageSocietyIdentityConstraints
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on social justice, one could use this quote to illustrate the hidden struggles individuals face.
More from Zora Neale Hurston
All quotes βLack of power and opportunity passes off too often for virtue.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
From barren brown stems to glistening leaf-buds; from the leaf-buds to snowy virginity of bloomβ¦It was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again. What? How? Why? This singing she heard that had nothing to do with her ears. The rose of the world was breathing out smell. It followed her through all her waking moments and caressed her in her sleep.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
Don't you realize that the sea is the home of water? All water is off on a journey unless it's in the sea, and it's homesick, and bound to make its way home someday.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves.
Zora Neale HurstonRead
Similar quotes
Man is a complex being: he makes deserts bloom - and lakes die.
Gil Scott-HeronRead
Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living in perfect freedom who has nothing more to say?
Kurt VonnegutRead
The secret of this kind of climbing, is like Zen. Don't think. Just dance along. It's the easiest thing in the world, actually easier than walking on flat ground which is monotonous. The cute little problems present themselves at each step and yet you don't hesitate and you find yourself on some other boulder you picked out for no special reason at all, just like zen.~ Japhy
Jack KerouacRead
The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man.
Thomas MalthusRead
Let our lives be in accordance with our convictions of right, each striving to carry out our principles.
Lucretia MottRead
I'm afraid we live at the mercy of a power, maybe a God, without mercy. And yet we find it, as I have, from others.
Philip LevineRead