Quotes by Phyllis Rose

“Perhaps that is what love is: the momentary or prolonged refusal to think of another person in terms of power”

“The secret of torture, like the secret of French cuisine, is that nothing is unthinkable.”

“God made them? You think God made them? Did God call White Flower Farm and order the bulbs? Did God put it on his credit card? Did God dig holes for the bulbs in the fall and mix bone meal in the dirt to feed them and cover them with mulch in the winter? If you think God did that, youre an idiot!”

Reading is almost always subversive. From the time you read the next nights fairy tale under the covers by flashlight when you have already had your bedtime story from Daddy and are supposed to be asleep to the time you are an adult reading junk, hoping no one catches you at it, reading is private; thats the most seductive thing about it. Its you and the book.

The writer… begins in confusion and nothingness and writes his way into clarity.

More people should visit Antarctica, metaphorically speaking, on their own. That is one of the conclusions I have reached, one of my recommendations: explore something, even if its just a bookshelf. Make a stab in the dark. Read off the beaten path. Your attention is precious. Be careful of other people trying to direct how you dispense it. Confront your own values. Decide what it is you are looking for an then look for it. Perform connoisseurship. We all need to create our own vocabulary of appreciation, or we are trapped by the vocabulary of others.

Every reading is a misreading.