“The past is so much safer, because whatever's in it has already happened. It can't be changed; so, in a way, there's nothing to dread.”
― The Heart Goes Last
― The Heart Goes Last
“I am constantly trying to communicate something incommunicable, to explain something inexplicable, to tell about something I only feel in my bones and which can only be experienced in those bones. Basically it is nothing other than this fear we have so often talked about, but fear spread to everything, fear of the greatest as of the smallest, fear, paralyzing fear of pronouncing a word, although this fear may not only be fear but also a longing for something greater than all that is fearful.”
― Letters to Milena
― Letters to Milena
“I wish this story were different. I wish it were more civilized. I wish it showed me in a better light, if not happier, than at least more active, less hesitant, less distracted by trivia. I wish it had more shape. I wish t were about love, or about sudden realizations important to one’s life, or even about sunsets, birds, rainstorms, or snow. I’m sorry there is so much pain in this story. I’m sorry it’s in fragments, like a body caught in crossfire or pulled apart by force. But there is nothing I can do to change it.”
― The Handmaid’s Tale
― The Handmaid’s Tale
“I have a deeply hidden and inarticulate desire for something beyond the daily life.”
― Moments of Being: A Collection of Autobiographical Writing
― Moments of Being: A Collection of Autobiographical Writing
Shannen’s 2025 Year in Books
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