If I got to make just one law, it would be that the men who make the decisions to drop bombs would first, every time, have to spend one whole day taking care of a baby. We were not made to do this killing thing, I swear. Back up. It's a big mistake.

—Barbara Kingsolver

war law children bombs killing care

About Barbara Kingsolver

Portrait of Barbara Kingsolver

Barbara Ellen Kingsolver (born April 8, 1955) is an American novelist, essayist, and poet. Her widely known works include The Poisonwood Bible, the tale of a missionary family in the Congo; and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, a nonfiction account of her family's attempts to eat locally. In 2023, she was awarded...

More quotations from Barbara Kingsolver

Solitude is a human presumption. Every quiet step is thunder to beetle life underfoot, a tug of impalpable thread on the web pulling mate to mate and predator to prey, a beginning or an end.

—Barbara Kingsolver

Memories do not always soften with time; some grow edges like knives.

—Barbara Kingsolver in The Lacuna

It's frightening when things you love appear suddenly changed from what you have always known.

—Barbara Kingsolver in The Poisonwood Bible

Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer.

—Barbara Kingsolver

What we lose in our great human exodus from the land is a rooted sense, as deep and intangible as religious faith, of why we need to hold on to the wild and beautiful places that once surrounded us. We seem to succumb so easily to the prevailing human tendency to pave such places over, build subdivisions upon them, and name them the Willows, or Peregrine's Roost, or Elk Meadows, after whatever it was that got killed there. Apparently, it's hard for us humans to doubt, even for a minute, that this program of plunking down our edifices at regular intervals over the entire landmass of planet Earth is overall a good idea.

—Barbara Kingsolver

More quotations tagged with “care”

We were classically in love, holding the classic beliefs: Everything is possible between us, we can authentically care for each other through not just the coming days but… the numerous busy decades to come.… It's in no way denigrating to admit what we all know: This time comes and then it goes.

—Jane Shapiro

The best thing against worry is to take care of others right away.

others worry care

To embrace the child may threaten the adult who values information above wonder, entertainment above play, and intelligence above ignorance. If we were really to care for the child, we would have to face our own lower natures—our indomitable emotions, our insane desires, and the vast range of our incapacity.

—Thomas Moore

emotions intelligence children information care adults

The more we take the welfare of others to heart and work for their benefit, the more benefit we derive for ourselves. This is a fact we can see. And the more selfish we remain and self-centered, the more selfish our way of life is, the lonelier we feel and the more miserable. This is also a fact we can see.

—14th Dalai Lama

life others loneliness heart selfishness care welfare benefit

What we cultivate and care about inwardly either freshens or poisons the bloodstream of humanity.

—Robert Corin Morris

humanity self care

History

3 Dec 2014 Added