Here's what I love: when a great writer turns me into a Jew from Chicago, a lesbian out of South Carolina, or a black woman moving into a subway entrance in Harlem. Turn me into something else, writers of the world. Make me Muslim, heretic, hermaphrodite. Put me into a crusader's armor, a cardinal's vestments. Let me feel the pygmy's heartbeat, the queen's breast, the torturer's pleasure, the Nile's taste, or the nomad's thirst. Tell me everything that I must know. Hold nothing back. . Pat Conroy
About This Quote

The quote above was written by Annie Dillard who described herself as a “lady of leisure.” She admired the great writers and artists of her time for making her into something that she did not wish to be and then turning her life into art.

Source: My Reading Life

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More Quotes By Pat Conroy
  1. I wanted to become the seeker, the aroused and passionate explorer, and it was better to go at it knowing nothing at all, always choosing the unmarked bottle, always choosing your own unproven method, armed with nothing but faith and a belief in astonishment.

  2. I’ve never had anyone’s approval, so I’ve learned to live without it.

  3. It did not look like the work of God, but it might have represented the handicraft of a God with a joyous sense of humor, a dancing God who loved mischief as much as prayer, and playfulness as much as mischief.

  4. The tide was a poem that only time could create, and I watched it stream and brim and makes its steady dash homeward, to the ocean.

  5. Happiness is an accident of nature, a beautiful and flawless aberration.

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