Akki

“Everyone here in the bureau is too quick to judge, and it will end in the death of someone innocent. But you, you are an eavesdropper. The only person in this bureau who truly listens.”
― June Hur, The Silence of Bones

“Why are my edges all sharpening—what I am going to gouge?”
― Han Kang, The Vegetarian

“For some people, the mask might become so tightly stuck that they can’t remove it,” I said. “Yes,” she said quietly. “Maybe that’s true.” She gave a faint smile. “But even if a mask gets stuck and can’t be removed, that doesn’t change the fact that beneath it, the real face remains.”
― Haruki Murakami, First Person Singular: Stories

“In life, the gaze of public opinion, the clash of interests, the struggle between rival greeds oblige us to hide our old rags, to disguise splits and stitches, to not extend to the world that which we reveal to our conscience; and the best of this obligation is when, by dint of deluding others, a man deludes himself, because in this case he is spared humiliation, which is a painful sensation, and hypocrisy, which is a ghastly vice. But in death, what a difference! What an unburdening! What freedom! How we can shake off our cloaks, toss our spangles into the gutter, unbutton ourselves, unpaint ourselves, unadorn ourselves, confess plainly what we were and what we failed to be!”
― Machado de Assis, The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas