have i truly returned... wow.... might just revive this side blog with all the reading i’ve been doing recently 

this oceanic chorus was affixed in no one person, that it seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere...

Daniel Aureliano Newman, “Portrait of an Invisible Artist: Transit by Rachel Cusk” 

Nothing much happens. But nothing can happen in many ways.

Daniel Aureliano Newman, “Portrait of an Invisible Artist: Transit by Rachel Cusk”

“I don’t see what women see in other women. What does a woman see in a woman that she can’t see in a man?” 

“Tenderness.” 

— The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath) 

I hated the idea of serving men in any way. I wanted to dictate my own thrilling letters.

The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath) 

I remember the ceilings over every bathtub I've stretched out in. I remember the texture of the ceilings and the cracks and the colours and the damp spots and then light fixtures. I remember the tubs, too: the antique griffin-legged tubs, and the modern coffin-shaped tubs, and the fancy pink marble tubs overlooking indoor lily ponds, and I remember the shapes and sizes of the water taps and the different sorts of soap-holders. I never feel so much myself as when I'm in a hot bath.

The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath)

small apology for the sudden inactivity! this blog is and will still be ongoing. i tend to add quotes only when i’m completely finished a book, and my final year of school as been a little overwhelming, so i haven’t had a chance to really queue anything until now. <3

I just don't think it's going to be much different than it is, not for now anyway. I want to leave before we break everything.

Stone Butch Blues (Leslie Feinberg)

I don’t feel like I’m worth anything. It’s only when you love me that I feel worth anything at all.

— Stone Butch Blues

Nobody seems to notice a concentrating reader: withdrawn, intent, the reader becomes commonplace.

A History of Reading (Alberto Manguel)

This was the world and I was king;

For me the bees came by to sing,

For me the swallows flew.

— “My Kingdom” by Robert Louis Stevenson, as quoted in A History of Reading (Alberto Manguel)

Only when, years later, I touched for the first time my lover's body did I realize that literature could sometimes fall short of the actual event.

A History of Reading (Alberto Manguel)

"All of us (by which I mean all of us, both normal and not-so-normal) are imperfect human beings living in an imperfect world. We don’t live with the mechanical precision of a bank account or by measuring all our lines and angles with rulers and protractors.” 

— Reiko, Norwegian Wood (Haruki Murakami)

I wanted to beg him to forgive me. But this would have been too great a confession.

Giovanni’s Room (James Baldwin)

For a woman I think a man is always a stranger. And there's something awful about being at the mercy of a stranger.

Hella, Giovanni’s Room (James Baldwin)

...you bring me fever but no delight.

Giovanni’s Room (James Baldwin)

I was guilty and irritated and filled with love and pain. I wanted to kick him and take him in my arms.

Giovanni’s Room (James Baldwin)