Taylor M. Irwin

“So many years past being raped, I tell myself what happened is “in the past.” This is only partly true. In too many ways, the past is still with me. The past is written on my body. I carry it every single day. The past sometimes feels like it might kill me. It is a very heavy burden.”
― Roxane Gay, Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body

“I often tell my students that fiction is about desire in one way or another. The older I get, the more I understand that life is generally the pursuit of desires. We want and want and oh how we want. We hunger.”
― Roxane Gay, Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body

“I also don’t think there’s any shame in saying that when I was raped, I became a victim, and to this day, while I am also many other things, I am still a victim.”
― Roxane Gay, Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body

“It’s the way people look at you when they know you’re damaged, but don’t know how to react to knowing a thing like that.”
― Rasmenia Massoud, Tied Within