Elif Safak Quotes

Bras are a ludicrous invention; but if you make bralessness a rule, you're just subjecting yourself to yet another repression.

On an occasion of this kind it becomes more than a moral duty to speak one's mind. It becomes a pleasure.

'Truth Will Set U Free' is about honesty. My philosophic belief that ultimately being true to yourself is liberating, with every individual's inalienable right to be who they are without fear or recrimination.

You were once wild here. Don't let them tame you.

In my own writing, I tend to be very honest, and my goal is to identify something people think but are afraid to say. That's not the general cultural expectation of women.

I could release myself into acting in a way that I was not released socially.

I'm known among my friends for saying things I probably shouldn't sometimes, but I have to get things out in the air.

Everything that feminism stands for is everything American, white, red and blue democratic. It is all the same stuff. So, I am boggled that I should have to give up this term that encapsulates what I want for my children, for my world, culture, brothers and sister because someone else thinks it means I don't shave my armpits.

I'm afraid I'm not sufficiently inhibited about the things that other women are inhibited about for me. They feel that you've given away trade secrets.

Punk allowed women to stop looking feminine. Oh, the relief.

Pop music allows you to be who you are without having to wear a social uniform or to conform, which some people find impossible to do.

The ladies of comedy now are comfortable dressing up. It's not forbidden anymore.

We hold back our true feelings and beliefs, whether it's from a sense of being polite or fear of hurting someone's feelings. But what I have seen on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show' is that no one benefits from holding back and keeping things bottled up inside. So I pride myself on speaking my mind and not being afraid to give honest feedback.

Everyone says 'Anna Karenina' is about individual desire going against society, but I actually think the opposite is stronger: the way societal forces limit the expression of the individual.

We are tired of having a 'sphere' doled out to us, and of being told that anything outside that sphere is 'unwomanly'. We want to be natural just for a change … we must be ourselves at all risks.

Most of us are too enmeshed in communities to live our ideals. Outsiders have less to lose.

I see society as something dangerous, and you have to save yourself from the rules. I think acting is the way I save myself.

The character I've created, Christine, is mainly the first attempt for me to escape all the secret injunctions we have as girls all the time. Like, be pretty but be polite. Don't take too much space. All those things that didn't mean anything to me. I just decided to turn them around with my character.

In my family, women rarely go out with their heads uncovered, so there was considerable opposition regarding my choice of career.

I feel liberated being around women who are liberated.

As a woman, you're expected to behave and model yourself in a certain way, but that's not right for everybody.

There's a great deal of tension between so many kind of distinctive and restrictive female archetypes and images in the world. When you play with the archetypes, you get free.

Sadly, I never really tell people what I think. So it's a real treat to play a woman who's able to speak her mind unabashedly.

Women who are stronger than the society allows them to be often feel a need for something stronger than themselves, and to dissolve into it.

I can't just go out in a T-Shirt and say, 'Hey, today I'm not wearing a bra.'