"It was like they waited to tell each other things that had never been told before. What she had to say was terrible and afraid. But what he would tell her was so true that it would make everything all right. Maybe it was a thing that could not be spoken with words or writing. Maybe he would have to let her understand this in a different way. That was the feeling she had with him."

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Source: Carson McCullers (1998). “Clock Without Hands”, p.71, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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Carson McCullers

Novelist

Carson McCullers was an American novelist and playwright known for her poignant exploration of loneliness and identity in works like 'The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter.'

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"It is a curious emotion, this certain homesickness I have in mind. With Americans, it is a national trait, as native to us as the roller-coaster or the jukebox. It is no simple longing for the home town or country of our birth. The emotion is Janus-faced: we are torn between a nostalgia for the familiar and an urge for the foreign and strange. As often as not, we are homesick most for the places we have never known."

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