Among adults โ and among orphans โ Wilbur Larch noted that delirious happiness was rare.
John IrvingItยดs natural to want someone you love to do what you want, or what you think would be good for them, but you have to let everything happen to them. You can't interfere with people you love any more than you're supposed to interfere with people you don't even know. And that's hard, ..., because you often feel like interfering -you want to be the one who makes the plans.
John IrvingHe had heard her say, so many times, that a society that approved of making abortion illegal was a society that approved of violence against women; that making abortion illegal was simply a sanctimonious, self-righteous form of violence against women- it was just another way of legalizing violence against women, Nurse Caroline would say.
John IrvingIt seems to me that people who donโt learn as easily as others suffer from a kind of learning disabilityโthere is something different about the way they comprehend unfamiliar materialโbut I fail to see how this disability is improved by psychiatric consultation. What seems to be lacking is a technical ability that those of us called โgood studentsโ are born with. Someone should concretely study these skills and teach them. What does a shrink have to do with the process?
John Irving