“What interests me very much as a writer is the ability for writing to have our lives to be occupied so vividly by others. I think that's what we long for as writers.” ThinkingWritingLongInterestAbilityOur Lives Author:Nicole Krauss
“Obviously I've been reading Kafka for a long long time, since I was really young, and even before I ever read him I knew who he was. I had this weird sense that he was some kind of family. Like Uncle Kafka. Now I really think of him that way, the way we think about an uncle who opened up some path for being in a family that otherwise wouldn't have existed. I think of him that way as a writer and a familial figure.” ThinkingKindLongReadingPath Author:Nicole Krauss
“She was gone, and all that was left was the space you'd grown around her, like a tree that grows around a fence. For a long time, it remained hollow. Years, maybe. And when at last it was filled again, you knew that the new love you felt for a woman would have been impossible without Alma. If it weren't for her, there would never have been an empty space, or the need to fill it.” IfsNeedsYearsLongHas BeensLastsLeftGrowsFeltSpaceGoneImpossibleTreeLove YouLong TimeEmptyFilledFenceHollowEmpty SpaceHistory Of Love Author:Nicole Krauss
“And if the man who once upon a time had been a boy who promised he'd never fall in love with another girl as long as he lived kept his promise, it wasn't because he was stubborn or even loyal. He couldn't help it.” IfsMenLongHelpingFallGirlBoysPromiseFalling In LoveLoyalStubbornOnce Upon A TimeNever Fall In LoveAnother GirlHistory Of Love Book:The History of Love: A Novel Source: The History of Love: A Novel
“That he liked to think of himself as a philosopher. That he questioned all things, even the most simple, to the extent that when someone passing him on the street raised his hat and said, 'Good day,' Litvinoff often paused so long to weigh evidence that by the time he'd settled on an answer the person had gone on his way, leaving him standing alone.” ThinkingWayPersonsLongSaidSimpleAnswersGoneStreetsEvidenceStandingAll ThingsRaisedLeavingPhilosopherPassingPassingsHatsGood DayStanding AloneLeaving Him Author:Nicole Krauss
“The truth was I'd given up waiting long ago. The moment had passed, the door between the lives we could have led and the lives we led had shut in our faces. Or better to say, in my face. Grammar of my life: as a rule of thumb, wherever there appears a plural, correct for singular. Should I ever let slip a royal We, put me out of my misery with a swift blow to the head.” ShouldLongMomentsFacesGivenWaitingDoorsMiseryBlowSlipsLong AgoShould IRoyalGrammarGiven UpThumbs Book:The History of Love: A Novel Source: The History of Love: A Novel
“Sometimes no length of string is long enough to say the thing that needs to be said. In such cases all the string can do, in whatever its form, is conduct a person's silence.” NeedsPersonsLongSaidSometimesEnoughFormCan DoSilenceCasesLengthStrings Book:The History of Love: A Novel Source: The History of Love: A Novel
“Our kiss was niticlimactic. It wasn't that the kiss was bad, but it was just a note of punctuation in our long conversation, a parenthetical remark made in order to assure each other of a deeply felt agreement, a mutual offer of companionship, which is so much more rare than sexual passion or even love.” LongMadeOrderPassionFeltOffersConversationKissingNotesAgreementMutualCompanionshipRemarksPunctuationLong Conversations Author:Nicole Krauss
“Once upon a time you were a fish. How do you know? Because I was also a fish. You, too? Sure. A long time ago. Anyway, being a fish, you knew how to swim. You were a great swimmer. A champion swimmer, you were. You loved the water. Why? What do you mean, why? Why did I love the water? Because it was your life! And as we talked, I would have let him go one finger at a time, until, without his realizing, he'd be floating without me. Perhaps that is what it means to be a father-to teach your child to live without you.” KnowsMeanChildrenLongFatherWaterRealizingTeachLong TimeFingersFishesYour ChildrenChampionSwimDo You KnowFloatingLong Time AgoWithout YouOnce Upon A TimeSwimmerLet Him Go Author:Nicole Krauss
“You’re lost in your own world, in the things that happen there, and you’ve locked all the doors. Sometimes I look at you sleeping. I wake up and look at you and I feel closer to you when you’re like that, unguarded, than when you’re awake. When you’re awake you’re like someone with her eyes closed, watching a movie on the inside of your eyelids. I can’t reach you anymore. Once upon a time I could, but not now, and not for a long time.” WorldFeelsLooksLongI CanSometimesHappensEyeLostSleepDoorsLong TimeWake UpAwakeLockedHer EyesOnce Upon A TimeEyelids Author:Nicole Krauss
“The misery of other people is only an abstraction something that can be sympathized with only by drawing from one's own experiences. But as it stands, true empathy remains impossible. And so long as it is, people will continue to suffer the pressure of their seemingly singular existence.” PeopleLongSufferingExistenceImpossibleEmpathyPressureRemainsMiseryDrawingAbstraction Author:Nicole Krauss
“I think of novels as houses. You live in them over the course of a long period, both as a reader and as a writer.” ThinkingLongCoursesHouseNovelReaderPeriods Author:Nicole Krauss
