Andy Zhang

“We look at the world once, in childhood. The rest is memory.”
― Louise Gluck

“What if we refused to be railroaded into the false choice between the critical and the uncritical? How might argument and interpretation proceed if critique were no longer our ubiquitous watchword and ever-vigilant watchdog? What other shapes of thought could we imagine? And how else might we venture to read, if we were not ordained to read suspiciously?”
― Rita Felski, The Limits of Critique

“Kitsch" is a German word born in the middle of the sentimental nineteenth century, and from German is entered all Western languages. Repeated use, however, has obliterated its original metaphysical meaning: kitsch is the absolute denial of shit, in both the literal and figurative sense of the word; kitsch excludes everything from its purview which is essentially unacceptable in human existence.”
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“To kill time - an English phrase that still chills me: time can be killed but only by frivolous matters and purposeless activities. No one thinks of suicide as a courageous endeavor to kill time.”
― Yiyun Li, Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life