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EntityQ481871· pop 17· linked from 74 articles

Amy Hempel

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American writer

Person · Open Library

Born
14 December 1951
Works
15

Top works

  • The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
  • Unleashed
  • Amy Hempel Reading
  • The collected stories of Amy Hempel
  • Des raisons de vivre

via Open Library + Wikidata

Music · MusicBrainz

Type
Person
Gender
Female
Origin
United States
Active from
1951-12-14

via MusicBrainz · CC0

Listeners · Last.fm

Listeners
10
Total plays
13

<a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Amy+Hempel">Read more on Last.fm</a>

via Last.fm · Amy Hempel

Quotes

  • I would like to go for a ride with you, have you take me to stand before a river in the dark where hundreds of lightning bugs blink this code in sequence: right here, nowhere else! Right now, never again!
  • Then the children went to bed, or at least went upstairs, and the men joined the women for a cigarette on the porch, absently picking ticks engorged like grapes off the sleeping dogs. And when the men kissed the women good night, and their weekend whiskers scratched the women's cheeks, the women did not think shave, they thought stay.
  • I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands. In the course of the experiment, that chimp had a baby. Imagine how her trainers must have thrilled when the mother, without prompting, began to sign her newborn. Baby, drink milk. Baby, play ball. And when the baby died, the mother stood over the body, her wrinkled hands moving with animal grace, forming again and again the words: Baby, come hug, Baby come hug, fluent now in the language of grief.
  • "There is no friction here. It's a kind and buoyant place. What you forget, living here, is that just because you have stopped sinking doesn't mean you're not still underwater."
  • Her ex stops by when he's in town and we pretend he's welcome. The two of them, Holly and this ex of hers, sit around and depress each other. They know all of each other's weak points and failings, so they can bring each down in two-tenths of a second. When she see him, Holly says, it's like the sunsets at the beach--once the sun drops the sand chills quickly. Then it's like a lot of times that were good ten minutes ago and don't count now.

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA