Written on the body is a secret code only visible in certain lights: the accumulations of a lifetime gather there. In places the palimpsest is so heavily worked that the letters feel like Braille. I like to keep my body rolled up away from prying eyes, never unfold too much, or tell the whole story. I didn't know that Louise would have reading hands. She has translated me into her own book.
Interpretation
This quote reflects how our physical bodies carry the stories of our lives, which can only be fully understood by those who truly care for us.
Jeanette Winterson's quote emphasizes the idea that our bodies are like living texts, containing the narratives of our experiences, emotions, and memories. While we may choose to conceal parts of ourselves from the world, certain people, like Louise, have the ability to interpret these hidden stories through their deep connection and empathy, effectively 'reading' the life we carry within us.
In practice
During a personal development workshop, one might use this quote to reflect on the nature of vulnerability in relationships.
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
You just wish sometimes that people would treat you like a human being rather than seeing your gender first and who you are second.
By mutual respect, understanding and with good will we can find acceptable solutions to any problems which exist or may arise between us.
Strictly speaking, one should not even rightly compare virginity to marriage because you cannot make a comparison between two things if one is good and the other evil.
Male dominance in society always means that out of public sight, in the private, ahistorical world of men with women, men are sexually dominating women.
I'm not that complicated. My complications come out in my songs. All you need to do to be my friend is like me.
Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him -- or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them.
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