Marriage was created not to be a background but to need one. Mine is going to be outstanding. It can't, shan't be the setting - it's going to be the performance, the lively, lovely, glamorous performance, and the world shall be the scenery.
Interpretation
Marriage should be a vibrant and central part of life, not just a backdrop.
In this quote, F. Scott Fitzgerald emphasizes that marriage should not merely serve as a passive backdrop to life but rather as an active and engaging performance. It suggests that one's relationship should be dynamic, exciting, and the focal point of one's existence, with the world as the supporting scenery that enhances the experience.
In practice
A wedding speech that highlights the importance of an exciting marriage.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
Kind people have a way of working their way inside me and rooting there.
I have worked hard to build relationships between Jewish people and black people.
But a man is not forgotten, as long as there are two people left under the sky. One, to tell the story; the other, to hear it.
Too many women are forced to abort by poverty, by their menfolk, by their parents. A choice is only possible if there are genuine alternatives.
It is exhausting knowing that most of the time the phone rings, most of the time there's an email, most of the time there's a letter, someone wants something of you.
Simple and faithless as a smile and shake of the hand.
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