Siri Hustvedt Quotes

Every sickness has an alien quality, a feeling of invasion and loss of control that is evident in the language we use about it."

Pain is always emotional. Fear and depression keep constant company with chronic hurting.

There is no future without a past, because what is to be cannot be imagined except as a form of repetition.

I've always thought of wholeness and integration as necessary myths. We're gragmented beings who cement ourselves together, but there are always cracks. Living with the cracks is part of being, well, reasonably healthy.

Reading is a private pursuit; one that takes place behind closed doors.

Dreams are stories made by and for the dreamer, and each dreamer has his own folds to open and knots to untie.

I will turn human anatomy into roses and stars and sea. I will dissect the beloveds body in metaphor.

A book is a collaboration between the one who reads and what is read and, at its best, that coming together is a love story like any other.

We read each other through our eyes, and anatomically they are an extension of our brains. When we catch someone's eye, we look into a mind.

Ture stories can't be told forward, only backward. We invent them from the vantage point of an ever-changing present and tell ourselves how they unfolded.