Everything was red, the air, the sun, whatever I looked at. Except for him. I fell in love with someone who was human. I watched him walk through the hills and come back in the evening when his work was through. I saw things no woman would see: that he knew how to cry, that he was alone. I cast myself at him, like a fool, but he didn't see me. And then one day he noticed I was beautiful and he wanted me. He broke me off and took me with him, in his hands, and I didn't care that I was dying until I actually was.
Alice HoffmanEven as a small child, I understood that woman had secrets, and that some of these were only to be told to daughters. In this way we were bound together for eternity.
Alice HoffmanAlways keep mint on your windowsill in August, to ensure that buzzing flies will stay outside, where they belong. Don't think the summer is over, even when roses droop and turn brown and the stars shift position in the sky. Never presume August is a safe or reliable time of the year.
Alice HoffmanStill anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The wise see a creature for what it is, not what it says it may be.
Alice HoffmanI don't really read as much as I used to. A lot of what I was looking for as an escape I find in writing. And the other thing is that I don't want to get into someone else's language when I'm working
Alice HoffmanSome things, when they change, never do return to the way they once were. Butterflies for instance, and women who've been in love with the wrong man too often.
Alice HoffmanA red map isn't easy to follow. Any document made of blood and bones is tricky. Wrong turns are easily made, and there are often piles of stones in the road. A person has to disregard time and sorrow and all the damage done. If you follow, if you dare, the thread always leads to whomever or whatever you've forgotten.
Alice HoffmanHe started to look at me in a manner I recognized: it was the way I looked at a new book, one I had never read before, one that surprised me with all it had to say.
Alice HoffmanYou can try to take sorrow and make it into something enduring, meaningful and beautiful. I always feel guilty that this is my job, that I get to do this
Alice HoffmanAre people drawn to each other because of the stories they carry inside? At the library I couldn’t help but notice which patrons checked out the same books. They appeared to have nothing in common, but who could tell what a person was truly made of? The unknown, the riddle, the deepest truth. I noticed them all: the ones who’d lost their way, the ones who’d lived their lives in ashes, the ones who had to prove themselves, the ones who, like me, had lost the ability to feel.
Alice HoffmanThat was the way illness appeared in a house, in the corners, in between floorboards, on the hooks in the closet, along with the sweaters and coats.
Alice HoffmanLove ambushed you, it lay in wait, dormant for days or years. It was the red thread, the peach stone, the kiss, the forgiveness. It came after you, it escaped you, it was invisible, it was everything.
Alice HoffmanThat is how you know you've left childhood behind-when you wish for time to go backward.
Alice Hoffman[Fairy tales] are like a journey to the woods and the many ways you can get lost. Some people say it's not a good idea to read fairy tales to anyone under the age of eight because they are brutal and raw. When I was a kid I often felt that kids's books were speaking down to me, but I never felt that way about fairy tales. They are bloody and scary, but so is life.
Alice HoffmanHearts were made for being broken. There's really no way around it if you want to be a human being.
Alice HoffmanThe nature of love had totally escaped her until now. She had thought that if you lost it, you could never get it back, like a stone thrown down a well. But it was like the water at the bottom of the well, there when you can't even see it, shifting in the dark.
Alice HoffmanAny institution becomes a community - whether it's a high school or a boarding school or a publishing company or a small town where everybody knows certain things about people.
Alice HoffmanCleaning up after themselves was a low priority for Margo and my mother. They had both recovered from cancer scares, failed marriages, and lost hope; in their opinion, dirt could wait.
Alice HoffmanI wasn't good company, that was true, and people avoided me, but that was all right. I was too busy dreaming.
Alice HoffmanI read "The Group" by Mary McCarthy. It had tons of sex in it, or so I thought at the time.
Alice HoffmanI saw the end of his life right there in that single moment. His pride, his decency, his secrets, his death.
Alice HoffmanI read Betty Smith's "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn," all of Shirley Jackson's books, which I loved.
Alice HoffmanMy mother, Abra, had taught me that all people are made from the same dust. When our days here are gone, all men and women enter the same garden.
Alice HoffmanI hate it when people tell me the end of the story because my mother always read the last page of a novel first to see whether she wanted to read it. It was a strange reading habit.
Alice HoffmanMy grief was cold. It was nothing to share. It was nothing to speak about, nothing to feel.
Alice HoffmanHow could I tell the doctor what was wrong with me? I didn't understand it myself. I couldn't articulate the pain; it was the pain of nothingness. My fear was of the weather, the atmosphere, the very air. What good did safety tips do me now? 'Avoid water, metal objects, rooftops; stay off the telephone in a storm, don't think glass can protect you; even if a storm was 8 miles away, you're still not safe from a strike. Avoid life perhaps that was the answer. The number one safety tip, stay away from it all.
Alice HoffmanI knew what it was to yearn for a life so distant it seemed that it had never been anything more than a dream.
Alice HoffmanAt midnight the wind in the tress can sound like the ocean. The moonlight can make a road appear as endless as the sea.
Alice HoffmanWeapons are kept from women, but such a naming suggests that perhaps men fear our talents in war as well as our desire for peace.
Alice HoffmanCertain things need not be said, and there’s nothing, not a whisper, prayer, not a sacrifice, not a payment of any price, that would change what’s about to happen.
Alice HoffmanSally...can no longer think of love as a reality, or even as a possibility, however remote.
Alice HoffmanMy darling girl, when are you going to realize that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage." - Aunt Frances
Alice HoffmanMothers always find ways to fit in the work - but then when you're working, you feel that you should be spending time with your children and then when you're with your children, you're thinking about working.
Alice Hoffman