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To translate a poem from thinking into English takes all night.

Grace Paley

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Grace Paley
Age: 84 †
Born: 1922
Born: December 11
Died: 2007
Died: August 21
Activist
Teacher
Writer
The Bronx
New York City
Translate
Poem
English
Takes
Night
Writing
Thinking

More quotes by Grace Paley

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In the end, long life is the reward, strength, and beauty.
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A joke is necessary at this time.
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It wasn't until I lived in the countryside that I began to understand the life of the countryside and the people in it and trees and water. Just learning about water is an education for a city person.
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Every time you finish something ... you figure you've finally learned to write, right? Then you start something else and it turns out you haven't. You have learned how to write that story, or that book, but you haven't learned how to write the next one.
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I didn't write any fiction until I was past thirty.
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I didn't intend. The word intend is the wrong word for what I do. It's just that it's something you do, and you can't not do. If you want to do it, and you don't intend to, you do it anyway. The word intend is wrong. The word pressure is right. It's like any art form.
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Waves, once they land on the beach, are not reversible.
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I don't have any degrees. I went to Hunter College one year and New York University another year. It's just on the basis of my books that I've been hired at any of the places I've been.
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Just when I most needed important conversation, a sniff of the man-wide world, that is, at least one brainy companion who could translate my friendly language into his tongue of undying carnal love, I was forced to lounge in our neighborhood park, surrounded by children.
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Well, by now you must know yourself, honey, whatever you do, life don't stop. It only sits a minute and dreams a dream.
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I'm really sorry for people growing up right now, because they have some cockeyed idea that they can get by with their eyes closed the cane they're tapping is money, and that won't take them in the right direction.
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I am very interested in people trying to write because I don't have a big academic background at all.
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I liked the education. I liked people learning things all around me and I liked going to people's classes.
Grace Paley
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When you have a peace movement that has an actual war, it's different from one that has wars that our country is not totally involved in. During the war in Vietnam, and to a lesser degree the wars in Central America where our country was directly involved, it was easier to organize.
Grace Paley
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For me, the meaning of life is the next generation.
Grace Paley
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We write about what we don't know about what we know.
Grace Paley
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Women should stick together. Didn’t you learn anything yet?
Grace Paley
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Sometimes before people know what they're saying, they already love the language.
Grace Paley
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I should have written more. I should have written more during the period when I just liked so much doing the political work in the streets.
Grace Paley
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The only recognizable feature of hope is action.
Grace Paley