They are all alike you know. They hold their tongues for years and you think you're safe, but when the opportunity comes they remember everything.
Edith WhartonRead
In any really good subject, one has only to probe deep enough to come to tears.
Interpretation
Exploring profound subjects often evokes deep emotional responses.
This quote by Edith Wharton highlights the emotional depth that can be found in deeply exploring significant topics. It suggests that true understanding and connection to a subject can lead to a profound emotional reaction, often resonating with tears as a symbol of the journey through complex feelings and insights.
In practice
This quote can be used in an art class discussion to explore the emotional impact of art.
They are all alike you know. They hold their tongues for years and you think you're safe, but when the opportunity comes they remember everything.
They seemed to come suddenly upon happiness as if they had surprised a butterfly in the winter woods
Set wide the window. Let me drink the day.
And I wonder, among all the tangles of this mortal coil, which one contains tighter knots to undo, & consequently suggests more tugging, & pain, & diversified elements of misery, than the marriage tie.
As he paid the hansom and followed his wife's long train into the house he took refuge in the comforting platitude that the first six months were always the most difficult in marriage. 'After that I suppose we shall have pretty nearly finished rubbing off each otherβs angles,' he reflected; but the worst of it was that May's pressure was already bearing on the very angles whose sharpness he most wanted to keep
There are two ways to spread happiness; either be the light who shines it or be the mirror who reflects it.
Ah, well, do I wish that we lived in a world where gender didn't figure so prominently? Of course. Do I even think about myself as a woman when I go to make art? Of course not.
I don't remember not dancing. When I realized I was alive and these were my parents, and I could walk and talk, I could dance.
I had just arrived in New York from California. I was nineteen years old and excited beyond belief. I was an art student and an acting student and behaved as most young actors did - meaning that there was no such thing as a good actor, 'cause you yourself hadn't shown up yet.
Beauty addresses itself chiefly to sight, but there is a beauty for the hearing too, as in certain combinations so words and in all kinds of music; for melodies and cadences are beautiful; and minds that lift themselves above the realm of sense to a higher order are aware of beauty in the conduct of life, in actions, in character, in the pursuits of the intellect; and there is the beauty of the virtues.
Why are all the artists so dead-set on distorting? It seems to be a reaction against photography, but I'm not sure.
Above all, a well-imagined story is organized around extraordinary human behaviors and unexpected and startling events, which help illuminate the commonplace and the ordinary.
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