The Most-Quoted Line from Mating in Captivity

Added: 2026-05-16

[00:00:00]There's a lot of sites that quote lines from Mating in Captivity. And I actually on occasion go to see like what was it that struck people? What did they catch here?

[00:00:10]And probably one of the most important sentences that has been quoted far and wide is that today we are asking one person to give us what what once an entire village used to provide. We want one person to give us grounding and belonging and identity to be a trusted confidant and a passionate lover to boot and all of this for the long haul and that long haul has kept getting longer.

[00:00:40]And this idea that you can't ask one person to give you everything, I just met a stewardess on the plane who came up to me and she said, "That line of your book, that really did something to me." And I just thought, "You, too?"

[00:00:55]That is probably the main line.