“In the South, Sunday morning sex is accompanied by church bells.”

“The belle is a product of the Deep South, which is a product of the nineteenth century and the Age of Romanticism. Virginia is a product of the eighteenth century. It's impossible to extract a belle from the Age of Reason.”

“Build a fence around the South and you'd have one big madhouse.”

“No matter which sex I went to bed with, I never smoked on the street”

“To make sure I learned the etiquette of grieving, Granny took me with her to the many funerals she attended. O Death, where is thy sting? Search me. I grew up looking at so many corpses that I still feel a faint touch of surprise whenever I see people move.”

“For a girl gone wrong, you can't beat the banks of the Wabash.”

“There's something unrefined about a reading woman, they always reek of the lamp. How can she grow up to be a lady if she's always got her nosein a book?Granny Rudin ”