Jeanette Winterson

Only the impossible is worth the effort.

"Why be happy when you could be normal?" Constance Winterson, adoptive mother of Jeanette Winterson.

What you risk reveals what you value. (p.91)

I am a glass man, but there is no light in me that can shine across the sea. I shall lead no one home, save no lives, not even my own.

She thought of an article she had once seen on mind control. Apparently if there was a person fiendish enough to set about interfering with your life, the only thing you could do was to concentrate hard on someone they were unlikely ever to have heard of called Martin Amis. The particular blankness of this image was guaranteed to protect from any subtle force, but Gloria realised with a sinking heart that it was too late now.

I say I'm in love with her. What does that mean? It means I review my future and my past in the light of this feeling. It is though I wrote in a foreign language that I am suddenly able to read. Wordlessly, she explains me to myself. Like genius, she is ignorant of what she does.

Tell me a story, Pew.

When was the last time you looked at anything, solely, and concentratedly, and for its own sake? Ordinary life passes in a near blur. If we go to the theatre or the cinema, the images before us change constantly, and there is the distraction of language. Our loved ones are so well known to us that there is no need to look at them, and one of the gentle jokes of married life is that we do not.

No safety without risk, and what you risk reveals what you value.

In a vacuum all photons travel at the same speed. They slow down when travelling through air or water or glass. Photons of different energies are slowed down at different rates. If Tolstoy had known this, would he have recognised the terrible untruth at the beginning of Anna Karenina? 'All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own particular way.' In fact it's the other way around. Happiness is a specific. Misery is a generalisation. People usually know exactly why they are happy. They very rarely know why they are miserable.

He doesn't understand I want the freedom to make my own mistakes.

My heart returns to me what I turn away. I am my own master but not always master of myself.

The curious are always in some danger.

I felt as if I had blundered into someone else's life by chance, discovered I wanted to stay, then blundered back into my own, without a clue, a hint, or a way of finishing the story.

It is easy to be selfish. It is hard to love who I am. No wonder I am surprised if you do. (p. 199)