Quotes from Pat Conroy

In the fantasy of the races conceived in my mind, all blacks were noble people who had struggled against a repressive social order for years and who were finally reaping the tangible rewards of this struggle. All whites, especially myself, were guilty of heinous, extraordinarily brutal crimes against humanity.

the world needs more roses far more than it needs more basketball players.

Love was not a bridesmaid of despair; love did not have to hurt. Armed with such potent knowledge, she returned quietly to the life she had abandoned.

I saw the necessity of living and accepting bullcrap in my midst. It was everywhere.

It's politics . . . It makes everybody stupid. When you grow up, you'll know what I mean.

It was a prayer of gratitude.

the sadness in her voice touched a deep place within me.

It's easier to be mean

The bridge only connected us with our town; it connected my mother with the world beyond Melrose Island, so inconceivably rich with promise.

I've never trusted a man who put cream or sugar in his coffee. Just like I never really trusted a man who put Coca-Cola in his bourbon.

M]otherlessness caused one of the great thirsts of the human condition.

They were remarkable in so many ways that the gifts they bestowed almost equaled the havoc they so thoughtlessly wreaked.

through her

found myself closing my eyes and walking the airy streets of Waterford made weightless by the buoyancy of my nostalgia.

My designation in the family was normality. I was the balanced child drafted into the ranks for leadership. for coolness under fire, stability. Solid as a rock, my mother would describe me to her friends, and I thought the description was perfect

You have to love what you can always come back to, what's home waiting for you.

Look around you. Look at your teammates. If you see black faces or white faces, you get the fuck off my team. No white. No black. No more. The time for that is over. We walk the world as a team, and we're going to have fun kicking a little ass this year.

I'm an American," I announced to all around me. "And I get to think anything I want to and so do you, by God, so do you." It became my credo, the central theme of my life

I was being cynical. I'm sorry. It's a family habit I've fallen prey to.

American teachers are all trained to think poor; we love conferences and book fairs with hospitality suites, expenses paid and banquets of rubbery chicken, sweet French dressing, and unspeakable peas

The great teachers fill you up with hope and shower you with a thousand reasons to embrace all aspects of life.

I would say, "Breathe deeply," and you would breathe and remember that smell for the rest of your life, the bold, fecund aroma of the tidal marsh, exquisite and sensual, the smell of the South in heat, a smell like new milk, semen, and spilled wine, all perfumed with seawater. My soul grazes like a lamb on the beauty of indrawn tides.

Who else would I take as prisoners of my high sanctity before my life was over?

Nothing so affects a small town as the loss of its rarest and finest man. Nothing so affects a southern family as the death of the man who lent it balance and fragility in a world askew with corrupt values. His faith had always been a form of splendid madness and his love affair with the world was a hymn of eloquent praise to the lamb who made him.