Mary Karr quotes

When people suffer, their relationships usually suffer as well. Period. And we all suffer because, as the Buddha says, that's the nature of being human and wanting stuff we don't always get. (Mary Karr)
If dysfunction means that a family doesn't work, then every family ambles into some arena in which that happens, where relationships get strained or even break down entirely. We fail each other or disappoint each other. That goes for parents, siblings, kids, marriage partners - the whole enchilada. View quote
Mary Karr
When I got sober, I thought giving up was saying goodbye to all the fun and all the sparkle, and it turned out to be just the opposite. That's when the sparkle started for me. View quote
Mary Karr
Childhood was terrifying for me. A kid has no control. You're three feet tall, flat broke, unemployed, and illiterate. Terror snaps you awake. You pay keen attention. People can just pick you up and move you and put you down. View quote
Mary Karr
People who didn't live pre-Internet can't grasp how devoid of ideas life in my hometown was. The only bookstores sold Bibles the size of coffee tables and dashboard Virgin Marys that glowed in the dark. View quote
Mary Karr
A dysfunctional family is any family with more than one person in it. View quote
Mary Karr
Sure the world breeds monsters, but kindness grows just as wild... View quote
Mary Karr
Ten years, she's dead, and I still find myself some mornings reaching for the phone to call her. She could no more be gone than gravity or the moon. View quote
Mary Karr
But I'm not ready to stop listening to the screwed-up inner voice that's been ordering me around for a lifetime. My head thinks it can kill me... and go on living without me. View quote
Mary Karr
Memoir is not an act of history but an act of memory, which is innately corrupt. View quote
Mary Karr
If you lie to your husband - even about something so banal as how much you drink - each lie is a brick in a wall going up between you, and when he tells you he loves you, it's deflected away. (Mary Karr)
Such a small, pure object a poem could be, made of nothing but air a tiny string of letters, maybe small enough to fit in the palm of your hand. But it could blow everybody's head off. View quote
Mary Karr
I'd spent way more years worrying about how to look like a poet -- buying black clothes, smearing on scarlet lipstick, languidly draping myself over thrift-store furniture -- than I had learning how to assemble words in some discernible order. View quote
Mary Karr
The shreiking fight or the out-of-character insult endures forever, while the daily sweetness dissolves like sugar in water. View quote
Mary Karr
Having a great dad probably permitted me to pal around with guys in a way that some women don't. View quote
Mary Karr
There are women succeeding beyond their wildest dreams because of their sobriety. View quote
Mary Karr
I tell people not to write too soon about their lives. Writing about yourself too young is loaded with psychological complexities. View quote
Mary Karr
I don't have a copy of my books, and the degree to which I never read them is profound. I never look. View quote
Mary Karr
The emotional stakes a memoirist bets with could not be higher, and it's physically enervating. I nap on a daily basis like a cross-country trucker. View quote
Mary Karr
As a memoirist, I strive for veracity. View quote
Mary Karr
I get about five memoirs per week in my mailbox, and few of them inspire anything but a desire to pick up the channel changer. (Mary Karr)
The failures of other genres to provide an emotional connection with some of their characters and narratives gives memoir a toehold. View quote
Mary Karr
I'm not nearly smart enough or imaginative enough to tackle the novel form. Never happen. View quote
Mary Karr
I think we fall in love and become adults and become citizens in a way by writing stories about ourselves. View quote
Mary Karr
I'm always terrified when I'm writing. View quote
Mary Karr

Mary Karr

Mary Karr - Image
Photo: Kara Hayes Smith - St. Louis County Library, CC BY-SA 2.0
Occupation: American Poet
Born: January 16, 1955
Quotes count: 37