Boris Abrams

“It is not because other people are dead that our affection for them grows faint, it is because we ourselves are dying.”
― Marcel Proust, The Captive / The Fugitive

“The greatest drug of all, my dear, was not one of those pills in so many colors that you took over the years, was not the opium, the hash you smoked in houses at the beach, or the speed or smack you shot up in Sutherland's apartment, no, it wasn't any of these. It was the city, darling, it was the city, the city itself. And do you see why I had to leave? As Santayana said, dear, artists are unhappy because they are not interested in happiness; they live for beauty. God, was that steaming, loathsome city beautiful!!! And why finally no human lover was possible, because I was in love with all men, with the city itself.”
― Andrew Holleran, Dancer from the Dance

“We fall in love for a smile, a look, a shoulder. That is enough; then, in the long hours of hope or sorrow, we fabricate a person, we compose a character.”
― Marcel Proust, The Captive / The Fugitive

“And remember this, that if you've been hated, you've also been loved.”
― Henry James, The Portrait of a Lady