February 18th, 2009 / 11:04 pm
Excerpts & Mean

Power Quote by Angela Carter: A Fancy Way of Saying “Eat Me”

From the short story, “The Lady of the House of Love” . I would normally stick my tongue between my two fingers,  but this is a much fancier and therefore a  better way of saying eat me?  This is a reaction to all the uncalled for harshness of life, for all the sick joy that people get from their little, or big, acts of hostility (I know, I should save it for Mean Monday, oops. I read the story this weekend, so it is fresh in my mind):

And I leave you as a souvenir the dark, fanged rose. I plucked from between my thighs, like a flower laid on a grave.  On a grave.

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11 Comments

  1. Matt

      ouch

  2. Matt

      ouch

  3. pr

      It’s a great vampire story. i read her a bunch a long time ago- she is really good. it was good to revisit her.

  4. Justin Taylor

      Rowr.

  5. Justin Taylor

      Rowr.

  6. pr

      She’s good, right? That story kicked my ass. Now i want to really revisit her.

  7. ryan

      “And I leave you as a souvenir the dark, fanged rose. I plucked from between my thighs, like a flower laid on a grave.”

      That’s dark/hot!

  8. ryan

      “And I leave you as a souvenir the dark, fanged rose. I plucked from between my thighs, like a flower laid on a grave.”

      That’s dark/hot!

  9. Roberta

      that woman regularly created more atmosphere in a few lines than so many authors manage in whole novels. at the point at which she was dying, she wrote ‘wise children,’ this jubilant, carnival kind of a novel, so different from her other works. there’s this salman rushdie quote on carter to the effect of ‘first she taught us how to write. then she taught us how to die.’

      i read that and thought ‘yep.’ she was so fab.

  10. Roberta

      that woman regularly created more atmosphere in a few lines than so many authors manage in whole novels. at the point at which she was dying, she wrote ‘wise children,’ this jubilant, carnival kind of a novel, so different from her other works. there’s this salman rushdie quote on carter to the effect of ‘first she taught us how to write. then she taught us how to die.’

      i read that and thought ‘yep.’ she was so fab.

  11. pr

      I was really into her when in grad school and then moved on. A week ago, I found this collection Gothic Tales (oxford univ press and yes, my house is a disaster which makes for good “look what i found” moments though) and read her story and a really good one by Isabel Allende. Thanks for mentioning wise children. Her language is so RICH. It’s a bit intense, but once you get into it -the rewards!