“Sometimes he wonders whether this very idea of loneliness is something he would feel at all had he not been awakened to the fact that he should be feeling lonely, that there is something strange and unacceptable about the life he has. Always, there are people asking him if he misses what it had never occurred to him to want, never occurred to him he might have . . . Some of them ask him with pity, and some ask him with suspicion: the first group feels sorry for him because they assume singledom is not his decision but a state imposed upon him; and the second group feels a kind of hostility for him, because they think that his singlehood is his decision, a defiant violation of a fundamental law of adulthood.” LonelinessJudgmentAdulthoodSingleA Little LifeHanya YanagiharaSocietal JudgmentSocietal Pressures Book:A Little Life Source: A Little Life
“My identity changed with the neighborhood I found myself in. In midtown, they thought I might be black, but in Harlem, they knew I wasn’t. I was spoken to in Spanish and Portuguese and Italian and even Hindi, and when I answered, “I’m Hawaiian,” I would invariably be told that they or their brother or cousin had been there after the war, and asked what I was doing up here, so far from home, when I could be on the beach with a pretty little hula girl. I never had an answer to these questions, but they didn’t expect one—it was all they knew to ask, but no one wanted to hear what I had to say.” LonelinessIdendity Book:To Paradise Source: To Paradise
“I don't know," he said, miserably. It was impossible to explain to the healthy the logic of the sick, and he didn't have the energy to try.” PsychologyLonelinessMental HealthMiseryMental Illness Book:A Little Life Source: A Little Life
“Nathaniel always says h’s mature for his age, which is one of those things worried parents say about their children when their children baffle them, but I think what he’s mature in is his loneliness. A child can be alone. But he shouldn’t be lonely. And our child is.” Loneliness Book:To Paradise Source: To Paradise
“he is so lonely that he sometimes feels it physically, a sodden clump of dirty laundry pressing against his chest. he cannot unlearn the feeling.” LonelinessJude St Francis Book:A Little Life Source: A Little Life