Quotes from Susanna Kaysen

A volte, quando avete capito che il vostro treno non si sta veramente muovendo, potete passare un altro mezzo minuto sospesi tra due regni della coscienza: quello che sa che non vi state muovendo e quello che invece ne ha la sensazione. Potete svolazzare avanti e indietro tra queste percezioni e provare una specie di vertigine mentale. E se è così, siete nel territorio della pazzia: un luogo dove le false impressioni hanno tutte le caratteristiche della realtà.

Something had been peeled back, a covering or shell that works to protect us. I couldn't decide whether the covering was something on me or something attached to every thing in the world. It didn't matter, really; wherever it had been, it wasn't there anymore.

These thoughts have no meaning. They are idiot mantras that exist in a prearranged cycle; I'm no good, I'm the Angel of Death, I'm stupid, I can't do anything. Thinking the first thought triggers the whole circuit.

The question was, What could we do? Could we get up every morning and take showers and put on clothes and go to work? Could we think straight? Could we not say crazy things when they occurred to us? Some of us could; some of us couldn't. In the world's terms, though, all of us were tainted.

What does the sign say?" " Ã¢â'¬ËœIf you lived here, you'd be home now.' Ã¢â'¬Â She clenched her hands with excitement. "See, every day people will drive past and read that sign and think, 'Yeah, if I lived here I'd be home now,' and I will be home. Motherfuckers.

There is thought, and then there is thinking about thoughts, and they don't feel the same.

This clarity made me able to behave normally, which posed some interesting questions. Was everybody seeing this stuff and acting as though they weren't? Was insanity just a matter of dropping the act?

like putting a gun in your mouth. But you put it there, you taste it, it's cold and greasy, your finger is on the trigger, and you find that a whole world lies between this moment and the moment you've been planning, when you'll pull the trigger. That world defeats you.

Recovered. Had my personality crossed over that border, whatever and wherever it was, to resume life within the confines of normal? Had I stopped arguing with my personality and learned to straddle the line between sane and insane?

An observer can't tell if a person is silent and still because inner life has stalled or because inner life is transfixingly busy

Era um dia de primavera desses que trazem esperança: cheio de brisas suaves e delicados aromas de terra aquecida.

They were living out lives we might have been living, if we hadn't been occupied with being mental patients.

Why I am opposed to antidepressants. Because I think depression has something to tell me. Because often depression is an appropriate reaction. Because I am terrified of changing the functioning of my brain in any way. Because I believe depression is me, and that without it I would not be me. Because I can't imagine my life without the time off I get from periodic depression. These are the typical idiotic reasons people give for not wanting to feel better. So in this respect, I am quite normal.

Particular patterns of thought get attached to particular movements or activities, and before you know it, it's impossible to approach that movement or activity without dislodging an avalanche of prethought thoughts.

On top of the bookcase were several Mexican papier-mâché figures of people with knives stuck through their heads and blood running down their faces...I found these comforting...They looked happy enough that way, and they were a nice metaphor for mental disturbance.

sa's smell (the fragrance of a beautiful man) is what I miss the most. […] Like a virus his smell entered me and changed my cells, slowly, over years, until they craved only that smell, which was their oxygen.

Can human beings love each other? Must we always love an image we've labored over secretly, never love the living soul with all its mire and murk?

Back then I didn't know that I­­or anyone­­could make a life out of boyfriends and literature. As far as I could see, life demanded skills I didn't have. The result was chronic emptiness and boredom. There were more pernicious results as well: self­loathing, alternating with inappropriately intense anger with frequent displays of temper...

Did the hospital specialize in poets and singers, or was it that the poets and singers specialized in madness?

Vuoto e noia: che eufemismo. Provavo la desolazione più nera. Desolazione disperazione e depressione. Ci sono altri modi di guardare a tutto ciò? In fondo, una inquietudine di dimensioni tali è un oggetto di lusso. Bisogna essere ben nutriti, vestiti e avere una bella casa, se si vuole aver tempo per tutta questa autocommiserazione.

Greece was a long lesson in my insignificance.

He would take refuge in a homey understanding of Faroese ways only to be slapped back to an uncomfortable position as an American by some terrible smell: uncomfortable because he could no more now imagine himself standing at an oak door with a brass knocker, wearing a tie and holding a bottle of Médoc, than he could picture eating rotten meat. He was floating around in cultural hyperspace; nothing felt right.

Il tessuto della cicatrice non ha carattere. Non è come la pelle. Non rivela età, malattia, pallore, o colorito. Non ha pori, né peli, né rughe. È come una fodera. Protegge e maschera quello che c'è sotto. Per questo ce lo facciamo crescere; abbiamo qualcosa da nascondere.

I once told her I wasn't good at anything. She said survival is a talent.