Constant Lying Is Not Aimed At Making The People Believe A Lie, But At Ensuring That No One Believes

Emily Dickinson, from a letter to Ottis P. Lord written c. March 1878

Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness

We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.

— Maya Angelou

“If by romantic they mean someone who dreams, I am a romantic, but I shall keep my crown of dreams a secret.”

— Anais Nin, 1917

Oscar Wilde, from At Verona

““I miss dreaming forwards,” Anna said. “What?” “I dream backwards now. You won’t believe how backwards you’ll dream someday.””

— Marina Keegan, The Opposite of Loneliness (via quoted-books)

“But I also think she was crying because, through the music, she might have guessed there were other ways of feeling, there were more delicate existences and even a certain luxury of the soul. She knew that there were a lot of things she didn’t know how to understand.”

— Clarice Lispector, from The Hour of the Star.

Sasha Chorny, translated by Bernard Meares, from “My Love,” written c. 1919

“I must change my life so that I can live it, not wait for it.”

— Susan Sontag (b. 16 January 1933)

“She was very private. I don’t think anyone will ever be able to totally capture her—she seemed so evanescent.”

— Joseph Mitchell