A Woman Is No Man Quotes
"Where I come from, voicelessness is the condition of my gender, as normal as the bosoms on a woman’s chest, as necessary as the next generation growing inside her belly."
"You’ve never heard this story before. No matter how many books you’ve read, how many tales you know, believe me: no one has ever told you a story like this one."
"I’ve learned that there’s a certain way I have to live, certain rules I have to follow, and that, as a woman, I will never have a legitimate claim over my own life."
"Soon you’ll learn that there’s no room for love in a woman’s life. There’s only one thing you’ll need, and that’s sabr, patience."
"No matter how far away from Palestine you go, a woman will always be a woman. Here or there. Location will not change her naseeb, her destiny."
"Marriage is what’s most important for women."
"It doesn’t matter where we live. Preserving our culture is what’s most important. All you need to worry about is finding a good man to provide for you."
"It was much more bearable to pretend her life was fiction than to accept her reality for what it was: limited. In fiction, the possibilities of her life were endless. In fiction, she was in control."
"It wasn’t her fault she wasn’t Arab enough. She had lived her entire life straddled between two cultures. She was neither Arab nor American. She belonged nowhere. She didn’t know who she was."
"It was easy for her to recognize that he was just being nice. They both knew a teenage Arab girl didn’t do anything."
"But here, in Brooklyn, all Fareeda could do was shelter them at home and pray they remained good. Pure. Arab."
"She gave a slow, reluctant smile. From the eager look on his face, she could tell he was waiting for her to do as he did, recite a vague representation of herself, sum up her essence in one line."
"She straightened in her seat, avoiding his question. Instead she asked, 'Why aren’t you a good student?'"
"She could have asked those questions aloud, but she knew people only told you what you wanted to hear."
"‘You’re strange,’ Nasser said. She could feel her face flush, and she looked away."
"If it were up to her, she’d postpone marriage for another decade."
"‘I just want to be happy,’ she told Nasser. ‘That’s all.’"
"But I’m only eighteen, Teta. I’m not ready to get married."
"All they had were grandparents who raised them out of obligation, and each other."
"She wondered what he saw, whether he knew that if he opened her up, he would find, right behind her ribs, only a fist of rot and mud."
"‘You don’t have to wear that thing, you know,’ Adam finally said. ‘You see, people here don’t care if your hair is showing. There’s no need to cover it up.’"
"‘But what about our religion?’ she whispered. ‘What about God?’"
"Perhaps this would be her first taste of freedom. There was no reason to reject it before she had tried it."
"The moon shone above them in a starless sky, illuminating the budding trees that lined the street."
"Immigrants from all over the world live here. You can see it in the food—meat dumplings, kofta, fish stews, challah bread."
"In bed, she closed her eyes, tried to silence her thoughts. She felt as if she were running frantically, spinning in circles."
"A man is the only way up in this world, even though he’ll climb a woman’s back to get there. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise."
"The word Islam means tawwakul. Submission to God. Islam is about peace, purity, and kindness."
"There are more important things to worry about than school."
"You didn’t have to be a woman or even an immigrant to understand what it felt like to not belong."
"It felt good to walk the streets alone, powerful."
"I’ve never skipped school before," Deya said. "And even if I could, how would I know it’s safe? I don’t know you."
"I’m sorry," Isra had whispered, again and again. I’m sorry.
"How low and desperate she felt, how much she wanted her mother—she’d had no idea until that moment."
"I’m a mother now, she thought. I’m a mother."
"Children are the glue that keep a husband and wife together."
"It was just the way it was. And Isra was no exception."
"At least here, in America, they were warm and had food on their table, their own roof over their heads."
"Better to be grounded, to know your place, than to live the way these Americans lived, cruising from day to day with no values to anchor them down."
"Fifteen years in this country, and she still didn’t feel safe."
"There is no better blessing than a healthy baby boy."
"What would we have done without our daughters? Fatima and Hannah do everything for me. I wouldn’t trade them for a thousand sons."
"Fear has a way of putting things in perspective."
"But pretending nothing’s wrong is not protecting yourself. If anything, it’s much more dangerous to live pretending to be someone you’re not."
"No, I think we need stories to protect us from the truth."
"What’s the point of saying what I think, or asking for what I want, if it will only lead to trouble?"
"You have to finish a story to know all the answers, and life was no different. Nothing was ever handed to you from the start."
"Please give me a chance to help. To be your friend."
"A real choice doesn’t have conditions. A real choice is free."
"No one really knows anyone, daughter. Even after a lifetime."
"Books have always kept me company when I felt most alone."
"It’s the loneliest people who love books the most."
"Its discontent that drives creation the most—passion, desire, defiance."
"Belonging. It’s hard to belong anywhere, truly belong, if we don’t belong to ourselves first."
"Just because she was sad, that doesn’t mean she hated being a mother."
"What she didn’t have was enough courage to make them."
"There are things in this life no one should see."
"What happens between a husband and wife must stay between them. Always. No matter what."
"You’ve just admitted you have choices. You’ve done worse than that, really."
"I feel hopeful for the first time in years. I don’t know why exactly, but I have you to thank for it."
"Walking the Brooklyn Bridge at dawn... In that moment, when the first light hits my face, I feel like the sun has swallowed me up."
"It always made me feel better, too, knowing I wasn’t the only person staring up at the mountains, that in those moments I was connected to everyone watching the sunset, all of us held together by this magnificent view."
"A love that came from inside her, one she felt when she was all alone, reading by the window. And through this love, she was beginning to believe, for the first time in her life, that maybe she was worthy after all."
"For so many years she had believed that if a woman was good enough, obedient enough, she might be worthy of a man’s love."
"Some days she thought she fasted out of guilt—for often failing to perform her five daily prayers, for failing to trust in Allah and her naseeb. Other days fasting reminded her of her childhood."
"It makes a difference to me. I’m the one who has to raise them."
"I want to make my own decisions. I want to have a choice."
"But for so long I haven’t had anything to call my own."
"I know it sounds selfish, but I was finally starting to feel like a person, like I had a purpose, something else in my life besides raising children all day and waiting for Adam to come home."
"And you never know, you might be carrying a boy this time."
"What do you know about Umm Ahmed? As a matter of fact, Hannah accepted a marriage proposal last night."
"There’s more to life than marriage. I thought you believed that. I know you do."
"So you want me to just accept my life for what they tell me it should be? What kind of life is that?"
"I’ll look him straight in the eyes and say, ‘I don’t want to marry you. I’ll make your life a living hell.’"
"No," Sarah said, standing up. "I won’t let that happen. Even if I have to scare every last man away."
"Despite the defiance in Sarah’s voice, Isra sensed her anxiety. 'We’ll see about that.'"
"You look beautiful," Isra told her. "Whatever," Sarah said, walking past her.
"Isra wondered if Sarah was serving the Turkish coffee first on purpose, the way she had done years ago, or if she really didn’t know better."
"Her powerlessness even comforted her somehow. Knowing that she couldn’t change things—that she didn’t have a choice—made living it more bearable."
"Isra had grown enough now to know that the world hurt less when you weren’t hoping."
"‘There is nothing in the world I hate more than that woman.’ ‘Shhh,’ Isra said. ‘She’ll hear you.’ ‘Let her.’"
"Sadness was like a cancer, she thought, a presence that staked its claim so quietly you might not even notice it until it was too late."
"These spoiled American children knew nothing about real work."
"‘You always look sad.’ ‘I’m not sad,’ Isra said again, with a smile this time. ‘I have you.’"
"‘I thought you wanted to help me.’ ‘I do!’ Sarah grabbed her hand. ‘I’m only telling you what I wish someone had told me—that running away is not the answer.’"
"What’s the matter? You don’t want them to see? Maybe it’s time they see what it means to be a woman."
"The cruelest thing on this earth is a man’s heart."
"The world hurt less when you weren’t hoping."
"I’m just worried about the kind of lives our daughters will have. If they’ll have any choices."
"To want what you can’t have in this life is the greatest pain of all."
"Mothers carry the entire family—arguably the entire world—on their shoulders. That’s why heaven lies under their feet."
"You expect me to believe that? Walek, look at you! Men should be lined up at my door."
"I don’t know where you’ve found this courage, and I envy you for it."
"No amount of time can bring back our family’s reputation."
"If only the bus would take the rest of her daughters, too."
"There’s something wrong with me, Mama. Something dark lurking in me."
"I’m ruining their lives anyway. I’m ruining them."
"Maybe someday we’ll have the courage to return."
"I’ve stopped praying, Mama. I know it’s kofr, sacrilege, to say this, but I’m so angry."