Mary McCarthy
Mary McCarthy
Mary Therese McCarthywas an American novelist, critic and political activist...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth21 June 1912
CitySeattle, WA
CountryUnited States of America
lying men extraordinary-person
The horror of Gandhi's murder lies not in the political motives behind it or in its consequences for Indian policy or for the future of non-violence; the horror lies simply in the fact that any man could look into the face of this extraordinary person and deliberately pull a trigger.
military politics retreat
In politics, it seems, retreat is honorable if dictated by military considerations and shameful if even suggested for ethical reasons.
children memorable people
People with bad consciences always fear the judgment of children.
children past reality
To care for the quarrels of the past, to identify oneself passionately with a cause that became, politically speaking, a losing cause with the birth of the modern world, is to experience a kind of straining against reality, a rebellious nonconformity that, again, is rare in America, where children are instructed in the virtues of the system they live under, as though history had achieved a happy ending in American civics.
hero suspense-novels novelists
The suspense of a novel is not only in the reader, but in the novelist, who is intensely curious about what will happen to the hero.
men people literature
When an American heiress wants to buy a man, she at once crosses the Atlantic. The only really materialistic people I have ever met have been Europeans.
writing past men
America is indeed a revelation, though not quite the one that was planned. Given a clean slate, man, it was hoped, would write the future. Instead, he has written his past.
car driving killing
Driving a car, you are in danger of killing; walking or standing, of being killed.
real flower wine
Like Michelangelo and Cellini, Florentines of every station are absorbed in acquiring real estate: a little apartment that can be rented to foreigners; a farm that will supply the owner with oil, wine, fruit, and flowers for the house.
hydrogen-bomb space people
It is impossible, except for theologians, to conceive of a world-wide scandal or a universe-wide scandal; the proof of this is the way people have settled down to living with nuclear fission, radiation poisoning, hydrogen bombs, satellites, and space rockets.
believe self ideas
All ideas advanced to deal with the Florentine noise problem, the Florentine traffic problem, are Utopian, and nobody believes in them, just as nobody believed in Machiavelli's Prince, a Utopian image of the ideally self-interested despot.
sports art hunting
Leisure was the sine qua non of the full Renaissance. The feudal nobility, having lost its martial function, sought diversion all over Europe in cultivated pastimes: sonneteering, the lute, games and acrostics, travel, gentlemanly studies and sports, hunting and hawking, treated as arts.
mad records injustice
Anybody who has ever tried to rectify an injustice or set a record straight comes to feel that he is going mad.
simplicity lines austerity
The famous Florentine elegance, which attracts tourists to the shops on Via Tornabuoni and Via della Vigna Nuova, is characterized by austerity of line, simplicity, economy of effect.