Frances Stevens: Even in this light, I can tell where your eyes are looking. Look John, hold them--diamonds--the only thing in the... world you can't resist. Then tell me you don't know what I'm talking about. Ever had a better offer in your whole life, one with everything? John Robie: I've never had a crazier one. Frances Stevens: Just as long as you're satisfied. John Robie: You know as well as I do, this necklace is imitation. Frances Stevens: Well, I'm not.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Frances Stevens: Mother, this is why I've had to spend half my life running around the world after you--to keep men like this away... from you. Mrs. Stevens: Well after this, let me run my own interference. It looks like the blockers are having all the fun.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
John Robie: And jewelry--you never wear any. Frances Stevens: I don't like cold things touching my skin.... John Robie: Why don't you invent some hot diamonds? Frances Stevens: I'd rather spend my money on more tangible excitement. John Robie: Tell me, what do you get a thrill out of most? Frances Stevens: I'm still looking for that one. He has ... a very good opinion of himself, which can by no means be considered a failing, for if a man does not esteem himself, he would certainly be very silly to expect the esteem of others. And although he is also well convinced of the importance of self-esteem, there is, perhaps, no one who more heartily detests open flattery than he does, and yet, strange to say, it sometimes sounds very pleasant to his ears; it puts him in such good humor with himself, and of course, with all about him, that he seems like quite another being while under its agreeable influence.... Now, I do not mean that he entertains an exalted opinion of his talents or acquirements, but merely that he thinks himself possessed of a good share of common sense, by which is meant a sound practical judgment of what is correct in the common affairs of life.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Both Eliot and Pound condense; their best verse is weighted--Pound's, with sensual experience primarily, and Eliot's with beliefs.... Where the mind's life is concerned the senses produce images, and beliefs produce dramatic cries. The condensation is important.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
... there is a dangerous trend observable in some quarters of the Movement to program Sapphire out of her "evil" ways into a cover...-up, shut-up, lay-back-and-be-cool obedience role. She is being assigned an unreal role of mute servant that supposedly neutralizes the acidic tension that exists between Black men and Black women. She is being encouraged--in the name of revolution no less--to cultivate "virtues" that if listed would sound like the personality traits of slaves.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
You remind me of a child-friend who once wrote to tell me about her sister being married. "Now I will tell you all about Bessie's ...wedding." Then came a long account of bridesmaids, and breakfast, and everything else, except the name of the bride-groom! That of course didn't matter: the great thing was to get married somehow.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
When she asked him about birth control, he sat down beside her and talked for half an hour about what a great woman Margaret Sange...r was and how birthcontrol was the greatest single blessing to mankind since the invention of fire.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The war won't ever be over... too damn profitable, do you get me? Back home they're coining money, the British are coining money; ...even the French, look at Bordeaux and Toulouse and Marseilles coining money and the goddam politicians, all of 'em got bank accounts in Amsterdam or Barcelona, the sons of bitches.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »