Wherever you look thereโs meanness and corruption. This room, this bottle of grape wine, these fruits in the basket, are all products of profit and loss. A fellow canโt live without giving his passive acceptance to meanness. Somebody wears his tail to a frazzle for every mouthful we eat and every stitch we wearโand nobody seems to know. Everybody is blind, dumb, and blunt-headedโstupid and mean.
Carson McCullersSome men are heroes by nature in that they will give all that is in them without regard to the effort or to the personal returns.
Carson McCullersA most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lillies of the swamp.
Carson McCullersThe curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves any possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain.
Carson McCullers