178 quotes found
Novelist · American · 1955
American novelist (born 1955)
“The phoenix must burn to emerge”
“Loneliness ia a human condition”
“The phoenix must burn to emerge.”
“Love humiliates you, hatred cradles you.”
“Isn't it funny.I'm enjoying my hatred so much more than i ever enjoyed love. Love is temperamental. Tiring. It makes demands. Love uses you, changes its mind. But hatred, now, that's something you ...”
“The cake had a trick candle that wouldn't go out, so I didn't get my wish. Which was just that it would always be like this, that my life could be a party just for me.”
“Don't turn over the rocks if you don't want to see the pale creatures who live under them.”
“I know what you are learning to endure. There is nothing to be done. Make sure nothing is wasted. Take notes. Remember it all, every insult, every tear. Tattoo it on the inside of your mind. In lif...”
“What can I say about life? Do I praise it for letting you live, or damn it for allowing the rest?”
“She had forgotten about this, the narcotic of the crowd. This is why you came to hear music. To stop being yourself, to let that thing that you supposedly were go, and just be part of a mob, synchr...”
“Loneliness is the human condition. Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you allows your soul room to grow. Never expect to outgrow loneliness. Never hope to find people who will understand you, so...”
“I hated labels anyway. People didn't fit in slots--prostitute, housewife, saint--like sorting the mail. We were so mutable, fluid with fear and desire, ideals and angles, changeable as water.”
“And if there is no god?You act as if there is, and it's the same thing.”
“She would be half a planet away, floating in a turquoise sea, dancing by moonlight to flamenco guitar.”
“Rena noticed me watching it pass. 'You think they don't got problem?' Rena said. 'Everybody got problem. You got me, they got insurance, house payment, Preparation H.' She smiled, baring the part b...”
“Always learn poems by heart. They have to become the marrow in your bones. Like fluoride in the water, they'll make your soul impervious to the world's soft decay.”
“Always learn poems by heart,' she said. 'They have to become the marrow in your bones. Like fluoride in the water, they'll make your soul impervious to the world's soft decay.”
“I couldn't stop thinking about the body, what a hard fact it was.That philosopher who said we think, therefore we are, should havespent an hour in the maternity ward of Waite Memorial Hospital. He'...”
“The question of good and the nature of evil will always be one of philosophys most intriguing problems, up there with the problem of existence itself. If evil means to be self-motivated, to be the ...”
“A cliche is everything you've ever heard of.”
“A novel is like a dream in which everyone is you. Theyre all parts of yourself.”
“I decided that if I was never going to sell anything as long as I lived, I might as well do what I want to do 'cause then at least I would've done what I wanted to do in life. What's that worth?”
“A person didnt need to be beautiful, they just needed to be loved. But I couldnt help wanting it. If that was the way I could be loved, to be beautiful, Id take it”