Southern Women Quotes

“She was so Southern that she cried tears that came straight from the Mississippi, and she always smelled faintly of cottonwood and peaches.”
― Sarah Addison Allen, Garden Spells

“It was this feminine conspiracy which made Southern society so pleasant. Women knew that a land where men were contented, uncontradicted ans safe in possession of unpunctured vanity was likely to be a very pleasant place for women to live. So, from the cradle to the grave, women strove to make men pleased with themselves, and the satisfied men repaid lavishly with gallantry and adoration. In fact, men willingly gave ladies everything in the world except credit for having intelligence.”
― Margaret Mitchell, Gone with the Wind

“With time, grief has a way of slipping down in the crevices of your heart. It never really leaves; it just makes room for more.”
― Nancy B. Brewer, Beyond Sandy Ridge

“Well, there are people who eat the earth and eat all the people on it like in the Bible with the locusts. Then there are people who stand around and watch them eat it. (Softly) Sometimes I think it ain't right to stand and watch them do it.”
― Lillian Hellman, The Little Foxes

“{Summertime she speaks of winter, she eats ham, but speaks of beef, got a good man but, flirts with another. She might as well go to hell, cause she ain't gonna be happy in heaven either!}”
― Nancy B. Brewer

“A little eccentricity is a help to a general. It helps with the newspapers. The women love it too. Southern women like their men religious and a little mad. That’s why the fall in love with preachers.”
― Michael Shaara, The Killer Angels: The Classic Novel of the Civil War

“She was a southern girl, which is the same as saying she was insane. All southern women are insane. Some are cold blooded killers and some are harmless eccentrics, but the best of the breed exhibit both of these characteristics and always the one you expect the least at the time you least expect it.”
― Bill Hicks, Love All the People: Letters, Lyrics, Routines

“When a Southern woman offers you a homecooked meal, you're only rude if you refuse. That goes for seconds and thirds too, by the way." -Ruby Watts”
― Brandy Heineman, Whispers in the Branches

“oh that's right, you never lie unless your mouth is open and words are coming out of it”
― Joshilyn Jackson, Gods in Alabama

“I have myself known two southern wives who exhorted their husbands to free those slaves towards whom they stood in a "parental relation;" and their request was granted. These husbands blushed before the superior nobleness of their wives' natures. Though they had only counseled them to do that which was their duty to do, it commanded their respect, and rendered their conduct more exemplary. Concealment was at an end, and confidence took the place of distrust.”
― Harriet A. Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself

“She was a southern girl, which is the same as saying she was insane.”
― Bill Hicks, Love All the People: Letters, Lyrics, Routines

“Today, it is the scent of honeysuckle that takes me back in time and lays me down near a barn. I pick a honeysuckle blossom, touch the trumpet to my nose and inhale. With sticky filthy fingers, I pinch the base of its delicate well then lick the drop of nectar. The sweet liquid makes me thirst for more, and I reach for another and another, the same hands that reach again and again for tobacco as I string. I separate honeysuckle blossoms and taste.”
― Brenda Sutton Rose

“As a rule, rich Southern women did not like to be surpassed in either need or beauty. The exception was with their daughters. Daughters of the South were to their mothers what tributaries were to the main rivers they flowed into: their source of immovable strength.”
― Sarah Addison Allen, The Peach Keeper

“...Southern women are impossible to live with because they will never find a man who treats them like their daddy did.”
― Maryln Schwartz, New Times In The Old South: Or Why Scarlett's in Therapy & Tara's Going Condo

“Writing is an act of faith. One must believe and see people who are invisible to others and be faithful to tell half formed stories. It’s like being on the trail of an apparition who’s repeatedly just out of reach.
K. Youngblood”
― Katherine Imogene Youngblood

“We stared at each other in silence until she looked away. I won. I always won, because I had my daddy’s eyes and she could only stare for so long, without looking away. I had my own ways of getting to Baby-Sweet.”
― Jaguar Jonez, Dem Country Girls Love Hard: Everybody Starts Off With A Clean Slate

“That's the measure of friendship, isn't it? Knowing people who will jar your secret and store it in a dark cellar forever. People who know it's never about the secret itself, but the keeping of it.”
― Karen White

“Why, she's as mild as a flower! She ain't hurt nobody! Now git in the kitchen and git some chicory!”
― Toni Orrill

“We were about to make love in the same bed I shared with my husband, and the extent of our immorality was weighing in on both of us, but not enough to stop us.”
― Jaguar Jonez, Dem Country Girls Love Hard: Everybody Starts Off With A Clean Slate

“Something Stinks in Denmark”
― Pamela Martin, Hard Whispers

“Because the thing about being a Southern girl is they let you run loose until the time comes to shape you.”
― Claire Fullerton, Little Tea

“She's a picture of concern, like some kind of well, bless your heart Southern woman in an old movie. Except that my freshman-year English teacher was from Alabama, and I know what Southern people mean when they say bless your heart.”
― Janet McNally, The Looking Glass: A Feminist Fairy Tale Journey of Self-Rescue, Sisterhood, and Finding a Missing Sister

“Y'all know that little gal Kelly Crawford that works down at Tuckers?" Tuckers Jiffy Lube was the only gas station and mechanical shop in town.
Jena Lynn's face contorted in disapproval.
"You referring to that scantily clad girl who runs the register?" I asked as Jena Lynn hopped up to retrieve the coffeepot.
"That's the one." Betsy curled up her lip in disgust.
"That girl is barely legal!" I was outraged.
"I know! I'm going to tell her granny. She'll take a hickory switch to the girl when she finds out what she's been up to. She was all over Darnell." Betsy wiped her nose with the back of her hand. She was right about that. Her granny wasn't the type to spare the rod; she parented old-school style.
Jena Lynn's tone rose as she stirred raw sugar into her coffee. "You caught them?"
"Well, I called him after what happened with poor Mr. Ledbetter---"
We shook our heads.
"---told him I was going to be late 'cause I was taking that extra shift. Guess he thought late meant real late 'cause when I got home, they we're rootin' around on my couch, the one my meemaw gave me last spring when she had her house redecorated."
We sat in stunned silence.
"I threw his junk out last night. And when he still didn't budge from the TV"---she paused for effect---"I set it all on fire, right there in the front yard." She leaned back and crossed her arms over her expansive chest.
"That's harsh." Sam stacked his empty plates. "Maybe it wasn't Darnell's fault." Jena Lynn and I gave him a disapproving glare. He appeared oblivious to his offense, and the moron had the audacity to reach into the container for a cream cheese Danish.
"Sam, if you value that scrawny hand of yours, I'd pull it out real slow or you'll be drawing back a nub," Betsy warned.
"Sheesh!" Sam jerked backward. It was obvious he didn't doubt her for a second. He marched toward the kitchen and dropped the plates in the bus tub with a loud thud.
"He should know better. You don't touch a gal's comfort food in a time of crisis," I said, and my sister nodded in agreement.
Jena Lynn patted Betsy on the arm. "Ignore him, Bets. He's a man."
I stood. "And if I may be so bold as to speak for all the women of the world who have been unfortunate enough to be in your shoes, we applaud you."
A satisfied smile spread across Betsy's lips. "Thank you." She took a little bow. "That's why my eyes look like they do. Smoke got to me." She leaned in closer. "I threw all his high school football trophies into the blaze while he was hollering at me. The whole neighborhood came out to watch."
I chuckled. The thought of Darnell Fryer running around watching all his belongings go up in smoke was hilarious. I wished I'd been there. "Did anyone try to step in and help Darnell?"
"Hell nah. He owes his buddies so much money from borrowing to pay his gambling debts, the ones that came out brought their camping chairs and watched the show while tossing back a few cold ones." She got up from the counter to scoop a glass full of ice and filled it with Diet Coke from the fountain. "Y'all, I gotta lose this weight now I'm back on the market."
Betsy was one of a kind.”
― Kate Young, Southern Sass and Killer Cravings

“Was I to go on living forever in love with a man who had no care for me, and never had? Was that what he wrote in the dedication? I hadn't lived my whole life. I was only twenty-two years old; and was I to love him for the rest of it, miserable and lonesome? Was that what James Sutton thought of Ozark women---women like me? That we just go on and on for want and never do find peace?

He had us all wrong. At least, he had me all wrong.”
― Allie Ray, Holler

“He must have seen. But like a child who believes there's a monster in the corner of his room, the truth was too simple and ordinary to bear. I told him I didn't love him, and he watched me like a ghostly shadow on the wall---watched hard for me to flicker, or twitch, or form the shape of a miserable thing. Hoping he might catch a glimpse of the Ozark Woman after all.”
― Allie Ray, Holler

“My Aunt Beverly sashayed when she walked. ... Her walk made the local boys sweat, well until those 'boys' were octogenarians. Anything she carried in her back pocket would have been as happily dizzy as a kid on a carnival ride. She sashayed like a Southern belle born in a time of dungarees and pedal pushers rather than restrictive skirts and social mores; she sashayed like a beautiful woman who was feeling sassy. She WAS beautiful, and she was sassy more often than not.”
― Kelly Kazek, It's a Southern Thing: Life's Different Here, Y'all

“Miss Annamae says to Daisy:
"A good Southern girl pays attention in school."
...
"Ain't no call for a Southern woman to rub your nose in the fact she's smarter than you. But make no mistake, she's gonna be smarter than you.”
― Kristen Ashley, Rock Chick Reawakening

“Southern women will steal your heart, and act like it was an accident.”
― Scott Thompson, Lost in ‘96

“Meanwhile, I learned my future depended not on the plans of another, but on fate and myself.”
― Harriette Simpson Arnow, Old Burnside

“No more foxglove. We promise." Celia put up her hand as if she was making a pledge.
"Okay. Good." Not poisoning men seemed like a smart plan.
"We can always plant something else if we need it." Gram dropped that then started toward the house.
"Gram."
"If men behave they have nothing to worry about." She gestured for me to follow her. "Come on. You know I like to eat at six."
I watched Gram and Celia walk away from this perfectly normal conversation. Heard them arguing about the superiority of green beans over broccoli as a side dish. Smelled the lemony punch of magnolias in the yard. Thought about having a predinner doughnut.
Poison or not, it was good to be home.”
― HelenKay Dimon, The Usual Family Mayhem