Ingrid

“Like a Zen master, she reduced to the essences: I do not need to walk around the Museum of Fine Arts; I do not need to be pushed around the MFA in the chair; I do not need the MFA at all, because its treasures, as I love them, are imprinted in my memory; and if they are wrongly memorized-a lily where there are tulips, the boy's torn hat rakish at the wrong angle-then this only makes the pictures the more mine.”
― Claire Messud, The Woman Upstairs

“you wouldn’t want them to know that in your heart, you are proud, and maybe even haughty, and are riven by thoughts the revelation of which would show everyone how deeply Not Nice you are.”
― Claire Messud, The Woman Upstairs

“I thought I could get to greatness, to my greatness, by plugging on, cleaning up each mess as it came, the way you’re taught to eat your greens before you have dessert.”
― Claire Messud, The Woman Upstairs

“Life is about deciding what matters. It's about the fantasy that determines the reality.”
― Claire Messud, The Woman Upstairs