A Quote by Mary Gaitskill

Stories are the rich, unseen underlayer of the most ordinary moments. — © Mary Gaitskill
Stories are the rich, unseen underlayer of the most ordinary moments.
You have ordinary moments and ordinary moments and more ordinary moments, and then, suddenly, there is something monumental right there. You have past and future colliding in the present, your own personal Big Bang, and nothing will ever be the same.
Most of the stories I write are women's stories - but the darker, unseen stories.
I couldn't remember ordinary moments, only the ones that had made an impression. Ordinary moments were the ones that fell away first.
There have been many articles about the top regrets that people have when they're dying. They are always, "I missed the ordinary moments." We miss those ordinary moments, and yet, that's what we're trying to distract ourselves from at the same time.
I really believe in people putting stories out there that contain the most difficult moments because nothing to me is more lonely making than sanitized stories or airbrushed stories that kind of allied how hard it got.
For them, it was nothing but an ordinary day on an ordinary day on an ordinary weekend, but for her, there was something revelatory about the notion that wonderful moments like these existed.
The opportunity for greater courage comes in the most ordinary of moments.
The ordinary is ultimately what moves us most deeply. It's what touches us, and it's what we most recognize, in great moments of art.
Never stop hoping for all of the righteous desires of your heart. But don't close your eyes and hearts to the simple and elegant beauties of each day's ordinary moments that make up a rich, well-lived life
These are the moments. These are the moments where you realize love is everywhere if you look closely. When you realize happiness isn't next weekend, and it's not last week, it's right now. That was one of the best nights of my life. It felt good to know purpose. I lay in my bunk and I think of all the stories I'm in. I think about all the stories that are in my story. I think about all the stories that are left to be written. And it might be my favorite book yet.
Sir, money, money, the most charming of all things; money, which will say more in one moment than the most elegant lover can in years. Perhaps you will say a man is not young; I answer he is rich. He is not genteel, handsome, witty, brave, good-humored, but he is rich, rich, rich, rich, rich -that one word contradicts everything you can say against him.
What is particularly intriguing, in fact, is that whereas many peoples tend to locate this experience (of the sacred) in certain unusual, if not 'supernatural' moments and circumstances . . . the Oriental focus is upon mystery in the most obvious, ordinary, mundane-the most natural-situations of life.
Realism sets itself at work to consider characters and events which are apparently the most ordinary and uninteresting, in order to extract from these their full value and true meaning. It would apprehend in all particulars the connection between the familiar and the extraordinary, and the seen and unseen of human nature.
The most extraordinary thing in the world is an ordinary man and an ordinary woman and their ordinary children.
A good life happens when you stop and are grateful for the ordinary moments that so many of us just steamroll over to try to find those extraordinary moments.
The stories I respect most aren't those with the rich, dense prose, but those which achieve a rich, deep effect with simple little nothing-sentences, lines I won't possibly remember, because they simply functioned, didn't draw attention to themselves, were properly humble.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!