Leonora Carrington

“I do not know of any religion that does not declare women to be feeble-minded, unclean, generally inferior creatures to males, although most Humans assume that we are the cream of all species. Women, alas; but thank God, Homo Sapiens! Most of us, I hope, are now aware that a woman should not have to demand Rights. The Rights were there from the beginning; they must be Taken Back Again, including the Mysteries which were ours and which were violated, stolen or destroyed, leaving us with the thankless hope of pleasing a male animal, probably of one’s own species.”

“I had a cup of tea, thought about my day and mostly about the horse whom, though I'd only known him a short time, I called my friend. I have few friends and am glad to have a horse for a friend. After the meal I smoked a cigarette and mused on the luxury it would be to go out, instead of talking to myself and boring myself to death with the same endless stories I'm forever telling myself. I am a very boring person, despite my enormous intelligence and distinguished appearance, and nobody knows this better than I. I've often told myself that if only I were given the opportunity, I'd perhaps become the centre of intellectual society. But by dint of talking to myself so much, I tend to repeat the same things all the time. But what can you expect? I'm a recluse.”

“The long tentacles of vision and understanding have withdrawn and all that is left to me is the ragged black hole of my loss. Loss and the world around. A noisy puzzle whose solution is another puzzle noisier and more stupid. The circle widens toward nothing.The answer is hiding somewhere, if I could only read.”

“Do you believe, she went on, that the past dies?Yes, said Margaret. Yes, if the present cuts its throat.”

“The skeleton was as happy as a madman whose straightjacket had been taken off. He felt liberated at being able to walk without flesh. The mosquitoes didn't bite him anymore. He didn't have to have his hair cut. He was neither hungry nor thirsty, hot nor cold. He was far from the lizard of love.”

“Anyway, Art [making] is a magic which makes the hours melt away and even days dissolve into seconds, isn't that so, dear lady?”

“Darling stop being philosophical it doesn't suit you, it makes your nose red.”

“People under seventy and over seven are very unreliable if they are not cats.”

“Wouldn't it be wonderful if I won a helicopter in a crossword puzzle competition? There is not much hope though I am afraid, as they never give such practical prizes.”

“This was most alarming, what sort of terrible toil had deranged the poor woman? Would I also have to work day and night till I couldn't stop talking? Perhaps they made her shovel coal for a huge furnace, probably they kept a private crematorium, old people do keep dying off. Maybe they had a chain gang too and we would have to chop stones and sing sea shanties (this would explain why she wore the yachting cap.)”

“One has to be careful what one takes when one goes away forever.”

“Reason must know the heart's reasons and every other reason”

“We went down into the silent garden. Dawn is the time when nothing breathes, the hour of silence. Everything is transfixed, only the light moves.”

“Military people never seem to apologize for killing each other yet novelists feel ashamed for writing some nice inert paper book that is not certain to be read by anybody.”

“You may not believe in magic but something very strange is happening at this very moment. Your head has dissolved into thin air and I can see the rhododendrons through your stomach. It's not that you are dead or anything dramatic like that, it is simply that you are fading away and I can't even remember your name.”