Quotes from Naomi Alderman

If you're going to stay here, you're going to need to own the place so they can't take it from you. The only way you're safe, honeybun, is if you own it.

In the beginning, therefore, the most important work is of separation. It is of pulling apart the tangled threads. It is of saying "This shall be separate from that. This shall be water, this shall be sky, and this shall be the line between them, the horizon." It is of setting a line between them.

She has always known exactly how to be silent.

Pourquoi ont-ils fait ça, [...] ?" Et l'autre répond : "Parce qu'ils le pouvaient." Et c'est la seule réponse qui sera jamais.

every measure of talent brings with it nine measures of work.

The voice says: If the world didn't need shaking up, why would this power have come alive now?

God loves all of us," she says, "and She wants us to know that She has changed Her garment merely. She is beyond female and male, She is beyond human understanding. But She calls your attention to that which you have forgotten. Jews: look to Miriam, not Moses, for what you can learn from her. Muslims: look to Fatima, not Muhammad. Buddhists: remember Tara, the mother of liberation. Christians: pray to Mary for your salvation.

There are no shortcuts. Not to understanding and not to knowledge. You can't put anyone into a box. Listen, even a stone isn't the same as any other stone,

The only way to be safe is to own the place.

It's a hot night; the air feels damp, like there's a storm brewing.

We should remember this. Often it may seem that time has taken us very far from our origin. But if we take only a few more steps, we will round the corner and see a familiar place. And sometimes it may seem that in all our traveling we have returned to the place where we began. But although the view may be similar, it will never be identical; we should remember that there is no return.

God is neither woman nor man but both these things. But now She has come to show us a new side to Her face, one we have ignored for too long.

To witness is the first responsibility.

What matters is that she could, if she wanted. The power to hurt is a kind of wealth.

She can't afford to afford to look weak, not at a time like this.

When a multitude speak with one voice, that is strength and that is power

someone a couple of years younger than her. She wants

When does power exist? Only in the moment it is exercised.

She sees it all in that instant, the shape of the tree of power. Root to tip, branching and re-branching. Of course, the old tree still stands. There is only one way, and that is to blast it entirely zo pieces.

Simple feels safe. Certainty feels safe.

When this thing happens, she is calm, floating above the storm, watching the raging sea below.

Beneath every story, there is another story. There is a hand within the hand - hasn't Allie learned that well enough? There is a blow behind the blow.

Os han enseñado que sois impuras, que no sois sagradas, que vuestro cuerpo es impuro y jamás podréis albergar lo divino. Os han enseñado a despreciar todo lo que sois y a desear ser un hombre. Pero son mentiras. La Diosa está en vuestro interior, ha regresado a la Tierra para enseñaros, con la forma de este nuevo poder. No acudáis a mí en busca de respuestas, pues debéis encontrar las respuestas en vuestro interior.»

What, then, does marriage teach us? It teaches us to strive for closeness. That intimacy cannot be attained or retained without effort.