Katherine Dunn Quotes

I'm sure mothers are important across every culture, but particularly in Korean society, the role of the mother is of great importance.

I find the family the most mysterious and fascinating institution in the world.

The functions of the family in a highly differentiated society are not to be interpreted as functions directly on behalf of the society, but on behalf of personality.

I can't think of anything to write about except families. They are a metaphor for every other part of society.

In some ways, the documentary form is a kind of trap and so is societal norms.

No man is free who is not master of himself... Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose?

All power is the same. Magic. Physical strength. Economic strength. Political strength. It all serves a single purpose-it gives its possessor a broader spectrum of choices. It creates alternative courses of action.

We seem to be always on cusps. Women come out of the burkah, the niqab, purdah, the closet, then go back in again. Of course, what we need do is to value the happy freedom of all beings.

True loyalty between individuals is possible only in a loose and relatively free society.

I do believe in choice, the freedom of choice and carving out your own happiness.

The future is the only kind of property that the masters willingly concede to the slaves.

Culture is your operating system.

[F]or as Socrates says that a wise man is a citizen of the world, so I thought that a wise woman was equally at liberty to range through every station or degree of men, to fix her choice wherever she pleased.

How do people stay in love, anyway? Is it a choice? Or is it like those plants we studied in biology that mutate into something new and totally different but are still part of the same plant family?

If one would discern the centers of dominance in any society, one need only look to its definitions of "virtue" and "vice" or "legal" and "criminal," for, in the strength to set standards, resides the strength to maintain control.

Their reasons don't mean anything unless I have a choice.

Did you hear? You are free." Yessss. Choice. It is a fine thing. And I choose to take you back, Most High.

Choice is the keynote of self-determinism. To determine anything, you must have the choice to determine. Choice to determine means that you must have the power of decision. Decision and time have a lot in common. When we have clean, clear decision, we have clean, clear time. And when we have indecision, there is an unclarity about time.

There's never been a civilization that has rewritten what marriage and family means and survived.

But there is another and greater distinction for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is the distinction of men into kings and subjects. Male and female are the distinctions of nature, good and bad the distinctions of heaven; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth inquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or of misery to mankind.

Sex, drugs, money, power etc. Just because you get to choose your master doesn't mean you aren't a slave.

As long as you're not hurting anyone, your choices are your choices.

Fear is only good when you have a choice in things.

When women are relegated to moods, mannerisms, and contours that conform to a single ideal of beauty and behavior, they are captured in both body and soul, and are no longer free.

People are born in a certain place, and in a certain society. I don't mean to sound like a determinist, but to think we're entirely free to do whatever we want betrays a certain class perspective. For most people who have to work for a living, and work at jobs under conditions they may not like, it's just not simple when it comes to freedom.