American culture is torn between our long romance with violence and our terror of the devastation wrought by war and crime and environmental havoc.

— Katherine Dunn

At its heart, 'Fat City' is not about boxing. It is a universal story of grim realities and toxic delusions. It is awash with awareness of chances blown, dreams stymied, precious time wasted, and all future prospects scorched to ashes by the process.

— Katherine Dunn

Can you be happy with the movies, and the ads, and the clothes in the stores, and the doctors, and the eyes as you walk down the street all telling you there is something wrong with you? No. You cannot be happy. Because, you poor darling baby, you believe them.

— Katherine Dunn

I am here, come closer,” the old donkey said with her eyes. “I will mother you.

— Katherine Dunn

I get glimpses of the horror of normalcy. Each of these innocents on the street is engulfed by a terror of their own ordinariness. They would do anything to be unique.

— Katherine Dunn

I have been a believer in the magic of language since, at a very early age, I discovered that some words got me into trouble and others got me out.

— Katherine Dunn

I knew what he felt. The huge buoyant air sack of love that filled his body had just exploded, and the collapse was devastating.

— Katherine Dunn

I know that some of the finest writing I've ever read has been sports writing, whatever the topic was, whatever the sport they were writing about. It seems to be an area where people are allowed a little more leeway than when they're reporting on traffic jams and city-council meetings.

— Katherine Dunn

I'm like every waitress in every diner I'm like every mom driving her kids to school. I'm nothing special at all.

— Katherine Dunn

In the United States, female fisticuffs were marginalized, first as erotic vaudeville in the 19th century and later as serious competition developed in the first half of the 20th. Legal wars waged by boxers in the 1960s and '70s won women the right to compete professionally nationwide.

— Katherine Dunn