David Thiedig

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up

“I wanted to pursue things, to know things, but I could not match the means of knowing that came naturally to me with the expectations of professors. The pursuit of knowing was freedom to me, the right to declare your own curiosities and follow them through all manner of books. I was made for the library, not the classroom. The classroom was a jail of other people's interests. The library was open, unending, free.”
― Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me

“It seems to me crucial — even ethically crucial — to treat with caution any rhetoric that purports to have all ethical goodness on its side.”
― Maggie Nelson

“How does one get across the fact that the best way to find out how people fell about their gender or sexuality - or anything else, really - is to listen to what they tell you, and to try to treat them accordingly, without shellacking over their version of reality with yours?”
― Maggie Nelson, The Argonauts