A Quote by Jamaica Kincaid

I had been a girl of whom certain things were expected, none of them too bad: a career as a nurse, for example; a sense of duty to my parents; obedience to the law and worship of convention. But in one year of being away from home, that girl had gone out of existence.
I don't think men like a bad girl. Well, I haven't had a date in a year so I'm obviously doing something wrong. It's not that my standards are too high, I haven't even been asked out in a year. I have no standards, anyone, please!
I dont think men like a bad girl. Well, I havent had a date in a year so Im obviously doing something wrong. Its not that my standards are too high, I havent even been asked out in a year. I have no standards, anyone, please!
As we talked, I had the sense of uncovering something precious and long-buried, fully formed. Our conversation was a process of removing layers, some of them easily dusted away. Other layers, requiring chisels or axes, were left alone for now. We revealed as much as we dared about what had happened during the years that separated us. But it wasn't what I had expected, being with Hardy again. There was something in me that remained stubbornly locked away, as if I were afraid to let out the emotion I had harbored for so long.
A real turnoff for guys is any girl who is way too into them. Like, you`re being way too nice. Guys, as well as girls, like that sense of badness. I want a good girl, who can be a little bad.
For a long time, no village girl would dress her hair or bosom with the sweetest flower from that field of death: and after many a year had come and gone, the berries growing there, were still believed to leave too deep a stain upon the hand that plucked them.
And while you and the rest of your kind are battling together-year after year-for this special privilege of being 'bored to death,' the 'real girl' that you're asking about, the marvelous girl, the girl with the big, beautiful, unspoken thoughts in her head, the girl with the big, brave, undone deeds in her heart, the girl that stories are made of, the girl whom you call 'improbable'-is moping off alone in some dark, cold corner-or sitting forlornly partnerless against the bleak wall of the ballroom-or hiding shyly up in the dressing-room-waiting to be discovered!
I went away, I was gone for 2 1/2 months, and they said, 'oh, Dr. Dre is engaged.' I had already had it out with this girl before I left. He was sleeping with her so I was like, 'Come on!'
He had married (as most young men did) because he had met a perfectly charming girl at the moment when a series of rather aimless sentimental adventures were ending in premature disgust; and she had represented peace, stability, comradeship, and the steadying sense of an unescapable duty.
I brought a picture with me that I had at home, of a girl in a swing with a castle and pretty blue bubbles in the background, to hang in my room, but that nurse here said the girl was naked from the waist up and not appropriate. You know, I've had that picture for fifty years and I never knew she was naked. If you ask me, I don't think the old men they've got here can see well enough to notice that she's bare-breasted. But, this is a Methodist home, so she's in the closet with my gallstones.
In the forties, to get a girl you had to be a GI or a jock. In the fifties, to get a girl you had to be Jewish. In the sixties, to get a girl you had to be black. In the seventies, to get a girl you've got to be a girl.
I've always been down to try out new things, but I was more of a jeans girl at age 17. I didn't want to show my legs. Now, I'm a dress-shirt girl, a shorts girl, a jeans girl, an overalls girl - I'll wear anything!
So a part of you is broken when that’s gone. And part of you wants to have that rebellious feeling where you’re just like, forget it — I can do anything I want. I’ve tried it, and I’ve never been that girl. I’m always going to be the girl you want to take home to your parents, not for the night.
For a moment, I wondered how different my life would have been had they been my parents, but I shook the thought away. I knew my father had done the best he could, and I had no regrets about the way I'd turned out. Regrets about the journey, maybe, but not the destination. Because however it had happened, I'd somehow ended up eating shrimp in a dingy downtown shack with a girl that I already knew I'd never forget.
Some people ask me whether I'm a 'mama's girl' or a 'papa's girl.' I'm nobody's girl. My brother clings to our parents; I'm the one shoving them out the door.
In France, the image I had was of a shy girl - a poor lonely girl and not too good-looking. When I went to England, I had another image. I felt the journalists were much more interested in my looks than in my songs.
In so many ways, a lot of the drive I've had to do certain things has been because of this sense that I have both the opportunity and in some sense the obligation to ratify that my parents' life had purpose.
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