My mother thought of my father as half barbarian and half blunt instrument, and she isolated him from his children.
Pat ConroyThe University of South Carolina has always played a role in my life and the intellectual life of South Carolina.
Pat ConroyWhen I was 5 years old, my mother read me 'Gone With The Wind' at night, before I went to bed. I remember her reading almost all year.
Pat ConroyI was born and raised on a Carolina sea island and I carried the sunshine of the low-country, inked in dark gold, on my back and shoulders.
Pat ConroyI stood face to face with the moon and the ocean and the future that spread out with all its bewildering immensity before me.
Pat ConroyGood writing is the hardest form of thinking. It involves the agony of turning profoundly difficult thoughts into lucid form, then forcing them into the tight-fitting uniform of language, making them visible and clear. If the writing is good, then the result seems effortless and inevitable. But when you want to say something life-changing or ineffable in a single sentence, you face both the limitations of the sentence itself and the extent of your own talent.
Pat Conroy