Best 4 quotes of Nora Gallagher on MyQuotes

Books were to my family's house like beds and stoves, the most basic items, necessary for survival

By Cunning & Craft is a masterpiece of writing about writing. If, like Scheherazade, you had to spin out a story under threat of death, this is the how-to book to read. It's filled with thoughtful, nuanced advice from a teacher/writer who actually writes, and writes beautifully and with great humor. The list of rejected stories is worth the price of the whole book.

On staring out at a gloomy day: First you must realize that it is the day that is gloomy, not you. If you want to be gloomy, too, that's all right, but it's not mandatory.

Every person was a mystery […] It was as if each of us had another, deeper life than the one being lived. It lies underneath our ordinary days, our errands, the doing of dishes, the writing of letters, the making of money, like something moving, lobster-like, underwater. This only partially understood life (refused, often; banished, easily ignored) might be what we call the soul. The desire to know about it causes us to pray. But all the while, it’s moving toward something, as surely as we are advancing in our lives, through careers, marriage, children. Every now and then, this hidden life surfaces, as if to enact itself, to bring something to fulfillment. Often, this happens when it intersects with another’s […] it was like a glimpse of things in that peculiar, vivid light after a rain.