Adam Schutz

“Where is it written that lives should have a meaning?”
― Elena Ferrante, The Story of the Lost Child

“Pylades: I’ll take care of you.
Orestes: It’s rotten work.
Pylades: Not to me. Not if it’s you.”
― Anne Carson, Euripides

“I have a theory," she said. I nodded at her to continue and she said, "There's this fireplace downstairs. I think I went down there for some reason. To hide, maybe. I thought it was all my fault my mother died. And I hit my head on the marble. My brain bled. I died."

She watched me.

"Right," I said. "I don't think that's possible."

"Why don't you think it's possible?" she asked. "Because everyone can see me?"

"It's not that. It's just that it seems to me that the dead only return for love or for revenge. Who did you come back for?"

Neither of us smiled. I felt light-headed I couldn't believe that we were discussing this.

"Love or revenge," she sighed. "Neither."

"Miranda," I said, "You're not dead. Okay?"

"Ore," she said. "I'm not alive.”
― Helen Oyeyemi, White Is for Witching

“The gap between the poetry she wrote and the poetry she contained was, for Natalie, something unsolvable”
― Shirley Jackson, Hangsaman