Sofie

“Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at. This determines not only most relations between men and women but also the relation of women to themselves. The surveyor of woman in herself is male; the surveyed female. Thus she turns herself into an object—and most particularly an object of vision.”
― Helena Goscilo, Dehexing Sex: Russian Womanhood During and After Glasnost

“If you start reading some book, even a very easy one, or listen to the clearest lecture in the world, with excessive attention, and an exaggerated concentration of mind, not only does the easy become difficult for you, not are you amazed and surprised and grieved at an unexpected difficulty, not do you strive harder to understand than you would have with less attention, not only do you understand less, but, if your attention and the fear of not understanding or of not letting something escape is really extreme, you will understand absolutely nothing, as if you hadn't read, and hadn't listened, and as if your were completely intent on another matter. For from to much comes nothing, and to much attention to a thing is the equivalent, in effect, of not paying attention, and of having another, completely different occupation, that is, attention itself. Nor will you be to gain your purpose unless you relax, and slow down your mind, placing it in a natural state, and soothe and put aside your concern to understand, which only in that case will be useful.”
― Giacomo Leopardi

“I don't want you to taint that fragile coat of astonishing colors created by my illusions, which no painter has ever been able to reproduce. Strange, isn't it, that no chemical will give a human being the iridescence that illusions give them?”
― Anaïs Nin, A Spy in the House of Love

“I've never been a coward at heart, although I've always been a coward in action”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky