Eileen

Book by Ottessa Moshfegh · 21 quotes · Ottessa Moshfegh, Eileen, Disaffected

Browse quotes from Eileen.

Book detail: Eileen is presented as a focused source page for quotations connected with this book, collection, transcript, or source record.

Browse quotes from Eileen.

The quotes below use the same card format as the rest of the site, including topics, source notes, copy actions, image creation, and sharing controls.

Eileen Quotes

“I preferred to read about ancient times, distant lands. Knowledge of anything current or faddish made me feel I was just a victim of isolation. If I avoided all that on purpose I could believe I was in control.”

Loneliness Isolation Girls Ancient Civilizations

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“A grown woman is like a coyote—she can get by on very little. Men are more like house cats. Leave them alone for too long and they'll die of sadness. Over the years I've grown to love men for this weakness.”

Sadness Men And Women

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“It's the map of my childhood, my sadness, my Eden, my hell and home.”

Sadness Childhood Sad Contradictory Ottessa Moshfegh Loss Of Innocence Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I did not listen to the Beatles or watch Ed Sullivan on TV. I wasn't interested in fun or popularity back then.”

Fun Popularity Beatles Ed Sullivan

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Growing up, I learned I'd be praised and rewarded for my suffering, for my strong efforts to be good, but every year God smote.”

Disappointment Karma Unfairness Ottessa Moshfegh Striving Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I felt I'd walked into a scene from a movie in which someone was going mad, the air heavy with suspense.”

Madness Suspense Ottessa Moshfegh Atmospheric Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“She awoke in my heart some long-sleeping dragon.”

Love Heart Metaphor Awakening Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“It had been a long time since I'd gone anyplace I wanted to be.”

Sad Unhappy Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I’d never heard my parents make love. If they made love, they did it silently, like bank robbers, like surgeons.”

Sex Parents

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“All I had to offer were my skills as a doormat, a blank wall, someone desperate enough to do anything—just short of murder, let's say—simply to get someone to like me, let alone love me.”

Desperate Unloved Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Anyway, I don't trust those people who poke around sad people's minds and tell them how interesting it all is up there. It's not interesting.”

Psychology Psychoanalysis

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“You can always tell something when a woman is overdressed---either she's an outsider, or she's insane.”

Women Crazy Fashion Insanity Outsiders Strangers Dress Females

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I can't say what I was looking for exactly, though I was ever hopeful that he might come out and profess his love, save me, run away with me, solve all my problems.”

Fantasy Salvation Savior Dreamer Unrequited Love Ottessa Moshfegh Daydream Eileen Imaginings

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I doubt she deserved the amount of hatred I directed at her, but I loathed just about everybody back then.”

Hatred Angry Hateful Loathing Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen Disaffected

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Life itself was like a book borrowed from a library, something that didn't belong to me and was due to expire.”

Religion Library Library Books Ottessa Moshfegh Ottessa

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Some families are so sick, so twisted, the only way out is for someone to die.”

Patricide

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I really despised him, everyone.”

Hatred Ottessa Moshfegh Misanthrope Misanthropic Eileen Disaffected

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I'd never learned how to relate to people, much less how to speak up for myself. I preferred to sit and rage quietly.”

Unspoken Ottessa Moshfegh Outsider Eileen Disaffected Suffer In Silence Put Upon

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Ludzie zachowują się jakby świat był w porządku, a to nieprawda. Świat jest do niczego. Ludzie umierają. Dzieci głodują. Bezdomni zamarzają na śmierć dokładnie w tej chwili. Tak nie powinno być. To nie jest fair.”

śMierć żYcie Cierpienie śWiat

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“I deplored silence. I deplored stillness. I hated almost everything. I was very unhappy and angry all the time. I tried to control myself, and that only made me more awkward, unhappier, and angrier. I was like Joan of Arc, or Hamlet, but born into the wrong life—the life of a nobody, a waif, invisible. There's no better way to say it: I was not myself back then. I was someone else. I was Eileen.”

Identity Angry Miserable Overlooked Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen Disaffected Allusions

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

“Perhaps I was lucky after all. It's very hard to measure out, in hindsight, who had it worse than whom.”

Lucky Hindsight Ottessa Moshfegh Eileen Worse Off

Book:Eileen

Source: Eileen

About the Author

Ottessa MoshfeghBrowse author quotes

Books by Same Author

My Year of Rest and RelaxationBrowse source quotes

Homesick for Another WorldBrowse source quotes

LapvonaBrowse source quotes

Death in Her HandsBrowse source quotes

McGlueBrowse source quotes

Similar Authors

No similar authors found.

Eileen

Filter quotes by topic

Eileen Quotes