Eric Dexter Brown

“Day after day he roamed about in the arctic cold, his soul filled full of bitterness and despair. He saw the world of civilization then more plainly than ever he had seen it before; a world in which nothing counted but brutal might, an order devised by those who possessed it for the subjugation of those who did not.”
― Upton Sinclair, The Jungle

“...most Substance-addicted people are also addicted to thinking, meaning they have a compulsive and unhealthy relationship with their own thinking.”
― David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest

“Just thoughts of what I have to do. Homework. And it comes up to my brain and I look at it and think "I'm not going to be able to do that" and then it cycles back down and the next one comes up. And then things come up like "You should be doing more extracurricular activities" because I should, I don't do near enough, and that gets pushed down and it's replaced with the big one: "What college are you going into, Craig?" which is like the doomsday question.”
― Ned Vizzini, It's Kind of a Funny Story

“I know a lot of famous people didn't do well at school, like James Brown; he dropped out in fifth grade to be an entertainer, I respect that... but that's not going to be me. I'm not going to be able to do anything but work as hard as possible all the time and compete with everyone I know all the time to make it.”
― Ned Vizzini, It's Kind of a Funny Story