“As far as I am concerned, I resign from humanity. I no longer want to be, nor can still be, a man. What should I do? Work for a social and political system, make a girl miserable? Hunt for weaknesses in philosophical systems, fight for moral and esthetic ideals? It’s all too little. I renounce my humanity even though I may find myself alone. But am I not already alone in this world from which I no longer expect anything?”
― On the Heights of Despair
― On the Heights of Despair
“I kept a picture of me kissing my dad’s corpse on the forehead in my wallet for years. I’d break it out any time someone showed me a baby picture, just so they would know how it ends.”
― Digging Up Mother: A Love Story
― Digging Up Mother: A Love Story
“One of the first signs of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die. This life appears unbearable, another unattainable. One is no longer ashamed of wanting to die; one asks to be moved from the old cell, which one hates, to a new one, which one willl only in time come to hate. In this there is also a residue of belief that during the move the master will chance to come along the corridor, look at the prisoner and say: "This man is not to be locked up again, He is to come with me.”
― The Blue Octavo Notebooks
― The Blue Octavo Notebooks
Ryan’s 2025 Year in Books
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