Csilla

“I mean maybe I was holding all of the aces, but what was the game?”
― Joan Didion, Play It As It Lays

“Ásgrímr segir: ‘Illa er slíkt mælt, at verða mǫnnum þá sízt at liði, er mest liggr við.’ Asgrim said, ‘These are mean words; you are of least use when the need is greatest.”
― Helen DeWitt, The Last Samurai

“In a less barbarous society children would not be in absolute economic subjection to the irrational beings into whose keeping fate has consigned them: they would be paid a decent hourly wage for attending school. As we don’t live in that enlightened society any adult, and especially a parent, has a terrible power over a child—how could I give that power to a man who—sometimes I thought I could and once I even picked up the phone but when I thought about it I just couldn’t. I”
― Helen DeWitt, The Last Samurai

“220. Imagine someone saying, "Our fundamental situation is joyful." Now imagine believing it.

221. Or forget belief: imagine feeling, even if for a moment, that it were true.”
― Maggie Nelson, Bluets