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Susanna Kaysen Quotes

Author

Susanna Kaysen is an American author best known for her autobiographical novel 'Girl, Interrupted,' which is based on her own experiences at the McLean Hospital psychiatric ward in the early 1960s.

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Famous Susanna Kaysen Quotes

“Our hospital was famous and had housed many great poets and singers. Did the hospital specialize in poets and singers, or was it that poets and singers specialized in madness?”

Art Crazy Madness Singers Insanity Poets Hospital Girl Interrupted Psych Ward Art And Madness

Book:Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

“Was I ever crazy? Maybe. Or maybe life is… Crazy isn’t being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever. They were not perfect, but they were my friends.”

Friendship Crazy Madness Insanity

Book:Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

“When women are angry at men, they call them heartless. When men are angry at women, they call them crazy.”

Men Crazy Angry Heartless

Author:Susanna Kaysen

“Lunatics are similar to designated hitters. Often an entire family is crazy, but since an entire family can't go into the hospital, one person is designated as crazy and goes inside. Then, depending on how the rest of the family is feeling that person is kept inside or snatched out, to prove something about the family's mental health.”

Persons Feelings Crazy Prove Depression Mental Health Hospitals Girl Interrupted Designated Hitter

Book:Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

“Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It's you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever.”

“Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? Maybe I was just crazy. Maybe it was the 60's. Or maybe I was just a girl... interrupted.”

Stills Dream Moving Girl Crazy Sitting Blue Train Confused Cash Stolen Interrupted Sitting Still Just A Girl Girl Interrupted

Author:Susanna Kaysen

“The only way to stay sane is to go a little crazy.”

Way Inspirational Littles Crazy Sane Being Crazy Girl Interrupted

Author:Susanna Kaysen

“Are you crazy? It's a common phrase, I know. But it means something particular to me: the tunnels, the security screens, the plastic forks, the shimmering, ever-shifting borderline that like all boundaries beckons and asks to be crossed. I do not want to cross it again.”

Knows Want Mean Asks Common Crazy Security Particular Crosses Screens Boundaries Phrases Plastic Shifting Tunnels Forks Borderline

Author:Susanna Kaysen

“For many of us, the hospital was as much a refuge as it was a prison. Though we were cut off from the world and all the trouble we enjoyed stirring up out there, we were also cut off from the demands and expectations that had driven us crazy. What could be expected of us now that we were stowed away in a loony bin?”

World Cutting Trouble Crazy Demand Expectations Prison Expected Driven Enjoyed Hospitals Refuge Stirring

Book:Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

“... now I was safe, now I was really crazy, and nobody could take me out of there.”

Crazy Safe Depression Illness Mental Illness Take Me

Book:Girl, Interrupted

Source: Girl, Interrupted

About the Author

Born: November 11, 1948
Known for: Author
Quotes: 96

Books & Sources

Girl, InterruptedRelated source material

The Camera My Mother Gave MeRelated source material

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