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Marisha Pessl

Marisha Pessl Quotes

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Famous Marisha Pessl Quotes

“I believe writers need to be chameleons, or like Meryl Streep, who can play all sorts of characters. A good writer should be able to cross gender lines and people of all social classes. So for me, writing from a male point of view would be a great challenge, that I would look forward to taking on.”

PeopleNeedsShouldWritingBelieveLooksPlayCharacterWould BeAbleI BelieveSocialChallengesLinesViewsClassCrossesMalesGenderPoint Of ViewGood WritersSocial ClassChameleon
Author:Marisha Pessl
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“Man's wobbly little mind isn't equipped for hauling around the great unknowns. Very few people realize, there's no point chasing after answers to life's important questions. They all have fickle, highly whimsical minds of their own. Nevertheless. If you're patient, if you don't rush them, when they're ready, they'll smash into you. And don't be surprised if afterward you're speechless and there are cartoon Tweety Birds chirping around your head. (Gareth van Meer)”

PeopleIfsMenMindLittlesImportantRealizingAnswersReadyBirdPatientNeverthelessCartoonChasingVansNo PointFickleImportant QuestionsWhimsicalSpeechlessLittle MindsAnswers To LifeBirds ChirpingTweety Bird
Author:Marisha Pessl
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“It was what accidental deaths did to people, made everybody's sea floor irregular and uneven, causing tidal currents to collide, surge upward, thereby resulting in small yet volatile eddies churning at everybody's surface. (In the more dangerous cases, it created a lasting whirlpool in which the strongest swimmers could drown.)”

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Book:Special Topics in Calamity Physics
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“Dad always warned that it was misleading when one imagined people, when one sas them in the Mind's Eye, because one never remembered them as they really were, with as many inconsistencies as there were hairs on a human head (100,000 to 200,000). Instead, the mind used a lazy shorthand, smoothed the person over into their most dominating characteristic--their pessimism or insecurity (something really being lazy, turning them into either Nice or Mean)--and one made the mistake of judging them from this basis alone and risked, on a subsequent encounter, being dangerously surprised.”

PeopleMindHumansMeanPersonsMadeEyeUsedMistakeNiceJudgingHairDadBasesRememberedCharacteristicsEncountersLazyInsecurityPessimismMisleadDominatingInconsistencyShorthandBeing Lazy
Author:Marisha Pessl
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“It felt as if we'd been to war together. Deep in a jungle, alone, I had relied on them, these strangers. They'd held me up in ways only people could. When it was over, an ending never felt like an ending, only an exhausted draw, we went our separate ways. Be we were bonded forever by the history of it, the simple fact they'd seen the raw side of me and me of them, a side no one, not even closest friends or family had ever seen before, or probably ever would.”

PeopleIfsWayWarFactsTogetherFeltSidesSimpleForeverDrawsStrangerClosestExhaustedJungleClosest FriendsSeparate Ways
Author:Marisha Pessl
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“She told me her father taught her to live life way beyond the cusp of it, way out in the outer reaches where most people never had the guts to go, where you got hurt. Where there was unimaginable beauty and pain ... They were always reminding themselves to stop measuring life in coffee spoons, mornings and afternoons, to keep swimming way, way down to the bottom of the ocean to find where the mermaids sang, each to each. Where there was danger and beauty and light. Only the now.”

PeopleWayLightPainFatherHurtMorningDangerTaughtOceanBottomCoffeeLive LifeGutsSwimmingAfternoonRemindingSpoonsMeasuringUnimaginableMermaidCuspGot Hurt
Author:Marisha Pessl
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“Life had been a suit I'd only put on for special occasions. Most of the time I kept it in the back of my closet, forgetting it was there. We were meant to die when it was barely stitched anymore, when the elbows and knees were stained with grass and mud, shoulder pads uneven from people hugging you all the time, downpours and blistering sun, the fabric faded, buttons gone.”

PeopleDiesForgetSunGoneSpecialShouldersSuitsOccasionsGrassKneesHugButtonsFabricClosetsMudFadedElbowsPadsSpecial Occasion
Author:Marisha Pessl
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