It's impossible to write about Native life without humor-that's how people maintain sanity.
Louise ErdrichRead
We have these earthly bodies. We don't know what they want. Half the time, we pretend they are under our mental thumb, but that is the illusion of the healthy and the protected. Of sedate lovers. For the body has emotions it conceives and carries through without concern for anyone or anything else. Love is one of those, I guess. Going back to something very old knit into the brain as we were growing. Hopeless. Scorching. Ordinary.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote explores the complex relationship between our physical bodies and emotions, emphasizing that love is a deeply rooted, intrinsic feeling.
In this quote, Louise Erdrich illustrates the disconnect that often exists between our minds and our bodies, particularly when it comes to love and desire. She suggests that our bodies have their own emotions and instincts that are not easily controlled by our mental faculties, revealing the profound and sometimes overwhelming nature of love as a fundamental human experience that transcends rational thought. By referring to love as something ancient and woven into our very being, Erdrich captures the innate and sometimes chaotic essence of our emotional lives.
Themes
LoveEmotionsBodyMindIllusion
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the complexities of love during a seminar on emotional intelligence.
More from Louise Erdrich
All quotes →It was just enough to sit there without words.
Louise ErdrichRead
Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart.
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The world tips away when we look into our children's faces.
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...which causes me to wonder, my own purpose on so many days as humble as the spider's, what is beautiful that I make? What is elegant? What feeds the world?
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Her mind was present because she was always gone. Her hands were filled because they grasped the meaning of empty. Life was simple. Her husband returned and she served him with indifferent patience this time. When he asked what had happened to her heat for him, she gestured to the west. The sun was setting. The sky was a body of fire.
Louise ErdrichRead
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