Alison Bechdel Quotes

I am not ultimately interested in writing fiction. I can't make things up. Or rather, I can only make things up about things that have already happened.

What would happen if we spoke the truth?

My transformation, thanks in part to Adrienne Rich, was easier than hers had been.

It's our very capacity for self-consciousness that makes us self-destructive!

Bookstore boss: [to Mo] The self-service kiosks have enabled us to cut down on staff, but some customers still feel the need to speak to an actual human. That's where you come in.
Customer: Excuse me, do you carry Jewish New Year cards?
Boss: I'm sorry, our New Years cards don't come in till November. But we'll be getting Jewish Christmas cards then, too!

Sydney: Imagine the cinematography if Ennis and Jack had been able to live together. Sweeping vistas of their couples therapist's office.

Lois: Oh, you guys have enough to worry about with your careers and all. You don't need to hear about my problems.
Ginger: Are you kidding? I'd much rather hear about your problems than work on my dissertation.
Lois: Thank you, Ginger. Considering you'd rather fellate Bill Clinton than work on your dissertation, that's very generous.

I only go to a movie if it satisfies three basic requirements. One, it has to have at least two women in it; two, two women talking to each other, and three, talking about something besides a man

Perhaps I identify too well with my father's illicit awe. A trace of this seems caught in the photo, just as a trace of Roy has been caught on the light-sensitive paper...It's a curiously ineffectual attempt at censorship. Why cross out the year and not the month? Why, for that matter, leave the photo in the envelope at all?

In an act of prestidigitation typical of the way my father juggled his public appearance and private reality, the evidence is simultaneously hidden and revealed.

I don't think your family was a very safe place to be a little girl.

It was a vicious cycle, though. The more gratification we found in our own geniuses, the more isolated we grew.

Stuart: Will you explain to me what these lesbian and gay groups are doing in bed with conservative Republicans?
Lois: Getting reamed. But they seem to like it.

"I remember feeling very angry at Betty Friedan."
AB: What? Why?
"Well... she hated housework and wanted women to be independent, but then she's hire other women to do her housework."

The maples had sheltered the west side of our house for over a hundred years, and left, as fallen trees do, a void so absolute you couldn't possibly have imagined it beforehand.

What if Icarus hadn't hurtled into the sea? What if he'd inherited his parent's inventive bent? What might have wrought?