“Human relationships are vast as deserts: they demand all daring, she seemed to suggest. ”

“She had begun to read in the beginning as a protection from the frightening and unpleasant things. She continued because, apart from the story, literature brought with it a kind of gentility for which she craved.”

“She would have liked to sit upon a rock and listen to words, not of any man, but detached, mysterious, poetic words that she alone would interpret through some sense inherited from sleep.”

“It was Sunday, and Mumma had gone next door with Lena and the little ones. Under the pepper tree in the yard Pa was sorting, counting, the empty bottles he would sell back: the bottles going clink clink as Pa stuck them in the sack. The fowls were fluffing in the dust and sun: that crook-neck white pullet Mumma said she would hit on the head if only she had the courage to; but she hadn't.”

“They walked on rather aimlessly. He hoped she wouldn't notice he was touched, because he wouldn't have known how to explain why. Here lay the great discrepancy between aesthetic truth and sleazy reality.”

“I expect we are all jealous of the women in their past, but how much less exciting if the women had not kept the bed warm.”

“Where have you been, Theodora?," Mrs Goodman asked."Walking, Mother.""And whom did you see?"Mrs Goodman flung her grammar like a stone."I did not see a cat," said Theodora.Mrs Goodman looked at her daughter, who giggled before she left the room.”