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Thank God Roxane Coss had not fallen in love with one of the Russians. She doubted they could make it up the stairs without stopping for a cigarette and telling at least one loud story that no one could understand.

Ann Patchett

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Ann Patchett
Age: 61
Born: 1963
Born: November 2
Author
Novelist
Writer
LA
California
Without
Fallen
Make
Loud
Love
Thank
Telling
Doubted
Least
Russians
Story
Stairs
Understand
Cigarette
Stories
Stopping

More quotes by Ann Patchett

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He used to say we all had a compass inside of us and what we needed to do was to find it and to follow it.
Ann Patchett
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You see an absolutely brilliant film later, as an adult, and you walk out thinking about what to have for dinner. Whereas something like Jaws winds up having a huge effect on me. If only my parents had been taking me to Kurosawa films when I was eight, but no.
Ann Patchett
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Home, bed, sleep, mother--who knew more beautiful words than these?
Ann Patchett
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Art stands on the shoulders of craft, which means that to get to the art, you must master the craft.
Ann Patchett
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But we cannot unbraid the story of another person’s life and take out all the parts that don’t suit our purposes and put forth only the ones that do.
Ann Patchett
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I have been accused of being a Pollyanna, but I think there are plenty of people dealing with the darker side of human nature, and if I am going to write about people who are kind and generous and loving and thoughtful, so what? In my life I have met astonishingly good people.
Ann Patchett
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To say it was a beautiful day would not begin to explain it. It was that day when the end of summer intersects perfectly with the start of fall .... [p.218 ff.]
Ann Patchett
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I could teach. I could wait tables. I could cook in a restaurant. Food and teaching were the two skills I had.
Ann Patchett
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When well told, a story captured the subtle movement of change. If a novel was a map of a country, a story was the bright silver pin that marked the crossroads.
Ann Patchett
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Love was action. It came to you. It was not a choice.
Ann Patchett
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There was no time for kissing but she wanted him to know that in the future there would be. A kiss in so much loneliness was like a hand pulling you up out of the water, scooping you up from a place of drowning and into the reckless abundance of air. A kiss, another kiss.
Ann Patchett
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Maybe that was the definition of life everlasting: the belief that the next generation would carry your work forward.
Ann Patchett
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I wanted to eat her pain, take it into me and make it my own.
Ann Patchett
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People gave me such a bad time about wanting a baby. I didn't want a baby, and I still don't. I wanted a dog.
Ann Patchett
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You are always someones favorite unfolding story
Ann Patchett
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I will go and speak at rotary clubs. I will go and speak at schools. I'm so much in the community, but in a way that I love. It's been such a positive thing.
Ann Patchett
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shame should be reserved for the things we choose to do, not the circumstances that life puts on us
Ann Patchett
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Maybe the private life wasn't forever. Maybe everyone got it for a little while and then spent the rest of their lives remembering.
Ann Patchett
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I made a startling discovery. Time spent writing = output of work. Amazing.
Ann Patchett
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I don't want to stand with somebody's praise.
Ann Patchett