Quotes from Elena Ferrante

Non sa niente di come si fa a mazzate: mai perdere di vista l'avversario, al rione non si facevano chiacchiere, al massimo si lanciavano urla a occhi sbarrati per mettere paura e intanto si colpiva per primi, facendo male il più possibile, senza fermarsi, toccava agli altri fermarti se ne erano capaci.

Finally she said something that I would never have had the courage to utter: "Look, Marcello tried in every possible way to buy me but no one is going to buy me.

I don't want my mother to die worrying about her sons." "Comfort her." "How." She smiled. "With lies. Lies are better than tranquilizers.

Talent is insufficient: if it's not cultivated, it ends up, in the best cases, inventing the wheel, only to discover that this has been done already.

La testa, ah sì, il male è là, è per l'insoddisfazione della testa che il corpo si sta ammalando.

Ahora la aterraba y la hacía sufrir la gruesa alianza que le brillaba en el anular. Incrédula, hizo un repaso de aquel día: la iglesia, el oficio religioso, la fiesta. Qué he hecho, pensó aturdida por el vino, qué es esta argolla de oro, este cero brillante dentro del que he metido el dedo.

Blijft het feit dat ik mijn hand opstak en zei dat het menselijke lot zo duidelijk aan de blinde razernij van het toeval was blootgesteld dat jezelf aan een God toevertrouwen hetzelfde was als plaatjes verzamelen terwijl de stad brandt in het hellevuur.

Ebbi l'impressione che si dibattesse per trovare, dall'interno della gabbia in cui si era chiusa, un modo d'essere tutto suo che però le restava oscuro.

And I had become, that was certain, but without an object, without a real passion, without a determined ambition.

Move on another plane in the name of one's own difference.

She deserved him because she thought that to love him meant to try to have him, not to hope that he would want her.

Mas foi sobretudo naquelas horas lentas que me senti realmente sua filha preferida. Quando me abraçava antes de eu ir embora, parecia querer deslizar para dentro de mim e ficar ali, assim como outrora habitei dentro dela.

Substancialmente falou que o problema da juventude era a falta de olhos para se ver e de sentimentos para se sentir com objetividade.

Alors elle prit un ton agressif comme pour me signifier que mon éventuelle noyade ne serait pas à lui imputer à elle, qui avait fait tout ce qu'il fallait pour l'éviter, mais entièrement à mon manque de mémoire.

Disse que vivíamos num país provincianíssimo, onde toda ocasião era boa para se lamentar, mas enquanto isso ninguém arregaçava as mangas e reorganizava as coisas tentando fazê-las funcionar.

We are flying over a ball of fire.

things without meaning are the most beautiful ones. It's

Adults, waiting for tomorrow, move in a present behind which is yesterday or the day before yesterday or at most last week: they don't want to think about the rest. Children don't know the meaning of yesterday, of the day before yesterday, or even of tomorrow

Professor Galiani listened and was impressed by her sincerity, by her unsettling tone, by the intense Italian of her sentences, by her skillfully controlled irony. She must have felt in Lila, I imagine, that elusive quality that seduced and at the same time alarmed, a siren power: it could happen to anyone, it happened to her, and

I nostri non erano così, mancava il tempo, mancavano i soldi, mancava la voglia

You had to hide everything from men. They preferred not to know, they preferred to pretend that what happened at the hands of the boss miraculously didn't happen to the women important to them and that—this was the idea they had grown up with—they had to protect her

La lontananza mi distingueva dentro ogni legame e ogni preoccupazione

Soon she'll start yelling, I thought, soon she'll hit her, trying to break that bond. Instead, the bond will become more twisted, will strengthen in remorse, in the humiliation of having shown herself in public to be an unaffectionate mother, not the mother of church or the Sunday supplements.

Essere fatta male nel senso vuol dire, evidentemente, non riuscire a provare piacere sotto i colpi del maschio, vuol dire torcersi di voglia strusciandosi per acquietare il desiderio, vuol dire afferrargliele mani, portarsele contro il sesso come a volte ho fatto io con Franco ignorando il suo fastidio, anche la noia di chi ha già avuto il suo orgasmo e ora vorrebbe assopirsi.