Important Quotations Explained
1. Ordinary,
said Aunt Lydia, is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary
to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary.
2. I
would like to believe this is a story I’m telling. I need to believe
it. I must believe it. Those who can believe that such stories are
only stories have a better chance. If it’s a story I’m telling,
then I have control over the ending. Then there will be an ending,
to the story, and real life will come after it. I can pick up where
I left off.
3. I
used to think of my body as an instrument, of pleasure, or a means
of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my
will . . . Now the flesh arranges itself differently. I’m a cloud,
congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is
hard and more real than I am and glows red within its translucent
wrapping.
4. He
was not a monster, to her. Probably he had some endearing trait:
he whistled, offkey, in the shower, he had a yen for truffles, he
called his dog Liebchen and made it sit up for little pieces of
raw steak. How easy it is to invent a humanity, for anyone at all.
What an available temptation.
5. The
problem wasn’t only with the women, he says. The main problem was
with the men. There was nothing for them anymore . . . I’m not talking
about sex, he says. That was part of it, the sex was too easy . .
. You know what they were complaining about the most? Inability
to feel. Men were turning off on sex, even. They were turning off
on marriage. Do they feel now? I say. Yes, he says, looking at me.
They do.
