May 2012
11 posts
“One of the things that’s perennially fascinating about the world is the way people sell things to themselves. If people feel the need to sell something to themselves, that tells its own tale.”
—Lightning Rods by Helen DeWitt
“Having to talk to people was one thing, but soliciting conversation was something else entirely. If I acted squirmy or didn’t make eye contact, they would want to know what was wrong and I would have to say ‘nothing,’ since nothing really was wrong. Nothing is an easy thing to feel but a difficult thing to express. It’s impossible to describe nothing without seeming sneaky.”
—Anthropology of an American Girl, H. T. Hamann
“Dad always says I’m ‘hatching a plan.’ Because I don’t talk much at home. Mum will say ‘she’s so quiet’ and Dad will say ‘she’s hatching a plan.’ Of course he doesn’t believe I’m doing anything more than daydreaming.”
—Heidi Julavits, The Uses of Enchantment
Terry Gross: “You write in your book: I wouldn’t be 25 again or even 40. Why not?”
Anna Quindlen: “Oh, I think I was still so unsure of myself, particularly at 25. I mean, you know, I talked a good game but there was still that sense of looking over my shoulder all the time in terms of what people expected of me, what I expected of myself, that thump, thump of ambition that’s kind of free floating when you’re young. I just feel like with every passing year I’ve sort of become more myself. I’ve sort of circled back to that little five year old girl, you know, who was kind of full of herself and didn’t take a whole lot of guff and did what she wanted to do and was comfortable in her own skin.”
— from her April 24 interview on Fresh Air
