James

“... I'm the fortieth-ugliest man in this bar. But so what! So what! What if someday she lets me kiss each one of her freckles again? She has like a million. But every one of them means something to me. Isn't this how people used to fall in love? I know we're living in Rubenstein's America, like you keep saying. But doesn't that just make us even more responsible for each other's fates? I mean, what if Eunice and I just said no to all this. To this bar. To this FACing. The two of us. What if we just went home and read books to each other?”
― Gary Shteyngart, Super Sad True Love Story

“That's what tyrants do, I guess. They make you covet their attention; they make you confuse attention for mercy.”
― Gary Shteyngart, Super Sad True Love Story

“I feel safe with him because he is so not my ideal and I feel like I can be myself because I'm not in love with him.”
― Gary Shteyngart, Super Sad True Love Story

“Sit in a room and read--and read and read. And read the right books by the right people. Your mind is brought onto that level, and you have a nice, mild, slow-burning rapture all the time.”
― Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth