Quotes from Ottessa Moshfegh

I don't care about being a literary personality - that doesn't appeal to me, especially because the literary world doesn't appeal to me. I actually don't feel like I even belong in it. If this was high school, I would be sitting with the Goths, looking at everyone, being like, 'Whatever.'

I'm a first - I was the first person in my family born in the United States. My mom is from Croatia, and my dad is from Iran. They met at music school in Belgium. I grew up as a pianist. I was really interested in piano and sort of discovered that I was a writer when I was about 13 and started writing.

I was the first person in my family born in the United States. My mom is from Croatia, and my dad is from Iran. They met at music school in Belgium. I grew up as a pianist.

In my own experience, I've found that it's very difficult to make peace with women. We tend to be competitive and feel angry.

I've always known what I'm meant to do. The path of my life has been about discovering what I need to do to support myself as a writer.

I love art because I feel that it's evidence of the great shared universal power. I like art that feels real, that cuts the bullshit.

I've found that people get particularly frustrated and shut down when women in fiction are disgusting or disordered.

I hope that I'm the kind of person who would step in between somebody holding a gun at somebody else. I would like to be that stupid. I'd like to be that in love with life.

My dad is a gentle and brilliant Iranian violinist.

Puberty extends into your twenties, for sure, and some people don't get over that until much later in life. I feel like I'm just starting to get over puberty - basically twenty years of insufferable, totally self-obsessed hell.

It's insane that people have these Internet identities. It has very little to do with who we really are. As a writer, who I'm friends with, how I spend my time, what I look like, what I wear, what I eat, what kind of music I like - it's totally not important to the work.

Once I finished 'Eileen,' I wanted to write more novels. I don't see myself stopping any time soon.

If you look at the horror genre, that work is all about making people uncomfortable by stimulating our fear of death.

I don't like talking too much about my personal life, but it all goes into my work.

For me writing isn't a mental exercise, it's barely even a literary exercise, it feels like a spiritual experience.