Can You Guess the Fictional Woman From Her Quote?


By Paulette Beete
And she said written in white outline letters on royal blue background
How well do you know the women of the Big Read? Find out in our latest quiz which we've cooked up in honor of Women's History Month. Your task is (deceivingly?) simple: guess which woman said what (and in which novel). If you're stumped, visit neabigread.org to jog your memory!  1. “Oh, you want too much!...I did love him once – but I loved you too." 2. “I said I would like it very much, which was a lie, but one must lie under certain circumstances and at all times when one can't do anything about them.” 3. “Always have the strength to live. Love life, and if despair enters your heart, look for me in the evenings when the wind is gentle and the owls sing in the hills. I shall be with you…” 4. “You can tell ‘em what I say if you wants to. Dat’s just de same as me ‘cause mah tongue is in mah friend’s mouf."  5. “You can’t ever have my books.” 6. “They's a time of change, an' when that comes, dyin' is a piece of all dyin', and bearin' is a piece of all bearin', an bearin' an' dyin' is two pieces of the same thing. An' then things ain't lonely any more.” 7. “Courage, I told myself. And this time, I felt it.” 8. "Without a life… a person lives where they can. If all they got is thoughts, that's where they live." 9. “I’d always be miserable in a city. I’d die of lonesomeness. I like to be where I know every stack and tree, and where all the ground is friendly.” 10. “I have never been one to flinch or crawfish when faced with an unpleasant task.” ANSWER KEY 1. Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 2. Jean Louise “Scout” Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee 3. Ultima from Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya 4. Janie Crawford from Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston 5. Unnamed old woman who refuses to leave her house when they burn her books from Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury 6. Ma Joad from The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck 7. Maria Teresa “Mate” Mirabal Reyes from In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez 8. Rosa Lublin from The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick 9. Ántonia Shimerda from My Ántonia by Willa Cather 10. Mattie Ross from True Grit by Charles Portis