But here in New York I was ignorant, insignificant, unimportant–one in millions whose destiny concerned no one. New York did not even know of my existence. Nor did it care.
AGNES SMEDLEYBut settled things were enemies to me and soon lost their newness and color. The unknown called.
More Agnes Smedley Quotes
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She said little, especially when my father or the men who worked for him were about I remember her instinctive and unhesitating sympathy for the miners.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
It was a technical Marxist subject and I did not understand it nor did I know what questions to ask.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
I feel like a person living on the brink of a volcano crater.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
Professors could silence me then; they had figures, diagrams, maps, books.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
In the little hall leading to it was a rack holding various Socialist or radical newspapers, tracts, and pamphlets in very small print and on very bad paper.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
Much that we read of Russia is imagination and desire only.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
The subjects treated were technical Marxist theories.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
Like all my family and class, I considered it a sign of weakness to show affection; to have been caught kissing my mother would have been a disgrace, and to have shown affection for my father would have been a disaster.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
I have no objection to a man being a man, however masculine that may be.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
Thousands of women are crushed and made inarticulate by that system and never develop as their natures would force them to develop were they in a decent environment.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
I would not let it ruin me as it ruined others! I would speak only with money, hard money.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
There’s something dreadfully decisive about a beheading.
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So I had to be the doctor to these wounded men until we could remove them to the hospital.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
I believe only in money, not in love or tenderness. Love and tenderness meant only pain and suffering and defeat.
AGNES SMEDLEY -
There are many men – such as those often to be found among the Indians – who are refined until they have qualities often attributed to the female sex. Yet they are men, and strong ones.
AGNES SMEDLEY






