Quotes from Jacqueline Harpman

Whether it was their fault or not, they'd gone mad by force of circumstance, they'd lost their reason because nothing in their lives made sense any more.

We had survived the prison, the plain and the loss of all hope, but the women had discovered that survival is no more than putting off the moment of death

It wasn't necessary for me to stop Anthea's heart. Each death had contributed a little to killing her. There had been so much hope when we'd escaped from the prison, and then the slow dissipation, the gradual abandonment of all expectations, a defeat that had killed everything without a battle. She wondered when it had dawned on us that we were as much prisoners out in the open as we had been behind bars.

If you do something that is forbidden, it is the action that is the target. If you do something that isn't forbidden, and they intervene, then it's not the activity that's attracting attention, it's you yourself.

Why should she want to live? We were doing nothing, we were going nowhere, we were nobody.

a surge of grief, I, who had never known men, as I stood in front of this man who had wanted to overcome fear and despair to enter eternity upright and furious.

Because I want to know! Sometimes, you can use what you know, but that's not what counts most. I want to know everything there is to know. Not because it's any use, but for the pleasure of knowing, and now I demand that you teach me everything you know, even if I will never be able to use it.

I was electrified by this theory, I could feel my footsteps dancing and I begin to laugh. I was perfectly aware that I had only added another question to all the others, but it was new, and that, in the absurd world in which I lived, and still do live, was happiness.

you don't build endurance by pushing yourself beyond your limits.

Had I become so rich that I could neglect some of my possessions?

I was happier when I hadn't understood anything, when I hated you all because you kept your secrets. You don't have any. You have nothing, and there is nothing to be had.' 'What secrets did you think we had?' I no longer felt humiliated by my ignorance, because I'd touched on a knowledge that was too painful to bear.

In my stories, there were always things happening: in my life, nothing would ever happen.

Otra pregunta que también quedará sin respuesta: me parece que no soy más que eso, preguntas sin respuesta.

It's true,' she agreed. 'You are the only one of us who belongs to this country.' 'No, this country belongs to me. I will be its sole owner and everything here will be mine.

Je ne connais pas que la plaine caillouteuse, l'errance et la lente perte de l'espoir, je suis le rejeton stérile d'une race dont je ne sais rien, pas même si elle a disparu. Peut-être que, quelque part, l'humanité resplendit sous les étoiles, ignorant qu'une fille de son sang achève sa vie dans le silence. Nous n'y pouvons rien.

Il est étrange que je meure de l'utérus, moi qui n'ai jamais eu de règles et qui n'ai pas connu les hommes.

Inside the bars, my strong, regular heart fuelled by youthful anger had restored to us our own territory; we'd established an area of freedom.

Alone and terrified, anger was my only weapon against the horror.

Me parecía que ese dolor nunca se calmaría, que había tomado posesión de mí de una vez por todas, que me impediría definitivamente consagrarme a algo que no fuera ese dolor, y lo aceptaba.

Me parece que no soy más que eso, preguntas sin respuesta.

sobrevivir solo es postergar el momento de morir

Qué importa ya si me he quedado muda en un mundo en donde no tengo nadie con quien hablar?

Quizá las personas que están solas no tienen tiempo. El tiempo solo se adquiere mirándolo pasar por los demás.

I am reduced to calling a memory the sense of existing in the same place, with the same people and doing the same things (...) For a very long time, the days went by, each one just like the day before then I began to think, and everything changed. Before, nothing happened other than this repetition of identical gestures, and the time seemed to stand still, even if I was vaguely aware that I was growing and that time was passing. My memory begins with my anger.