A Little Life-Hanya Yanagihara
I have much more criticism for this book than I do praise, and I don't think I would ever recommend it to anyone, but I gave it three stars on Goodreads because, FOR WHATEVER REASON, I read all 814 pages. I may write more about what specifically I disliked about it in another entry.
To conceive of such a luxury, you needed an American mind. (32)
Opposite Willem that afternoon is a Thom Gunn poem: “Their relationship consisted/ In discussing if it existed.” Underneath, someone has written in black marker, “Don’t worry man I can’t get no pussy neither.” He closes his eyes. (44)
How did you know that it was time to give up? Was it when you were thirty-eight and still hadn’t found an agent? Was it when you were forty and still had a roommate and were making more as a part-time waiter than you had made the year you decided to be a full-time actor? Was it when you got fat, or bald, or got bad plastic surgery that couldn’t disguise the fact that you were fat and bald? When did pursuing your ambitions cross the line from brave into foolhardy? How did you know when to stop? In earlier, more rigid, less encouraging (and ultimately, more helpful) decades, things would be much clearer: you would stop when you turned forty, or when you got married, or when you had kids, or after five years, or ten years, or fifteen. And then you would go get a real job, and acting and your dreams for a career in it would recede into the evening, a melting into history as quiet as a briquette of ice sliding into a warm bath. (48)
They bragged of what they would be doing if they hadn’t gone into this wretched industry: they’d be a curator (possibly the one job where you’d make even less than you did now), a sommelier (well, make that two jobs), a gallery owner (make it three), a writer (all right, four-clearly none of them were equipped to make money, ever, in any imagining). (65)
…whom Malcolm had begin to think of as not so much black but pre-black, as if blackness, like nirvana, was an idealized state that he was constantly striving to erupt into. (68)
At his age, the only truly important aspects of one’s identity were sexual prowess; professional accomplishments; and money. (71)
…every day it became more and more remote, until it was just a memory, and so was she, a beloved character from a book he’d read long ago. (123)
The standard interpretation of the first line was “I am lost to the world,” but he read it as “I have become lost to the world,” which, he believed, was less self-pitying, less melodramatic, and more resigned, more confused. I have become lost to the world/ In which I otherwise wasted so much time. (125)
And in that way, law school breaks a mind down. Novelists, poets, and artists don’t often do well in law school (unless they are bad novelists, poets, and artists), but neither, necessarily, do mathematicians, logicians, and scientists. The first group fails because their logic is their own; the second fails because logic is all they own. (188)
“And I didn’t even really like her,” Willem had told him in one of their phone calls. “I did it for the worst reason of all-because I was bored.”
He had considered this. “No,” he said, “the worst reason of all would’ve been because you were trying to be cruel. Yours was just the stupidest reason of all.” (440)
He was always, always trying to decide how he should be-if his thoughts should be of acceptance or of escape. (613)
He now viewed a successful relationship as one in which both people had recognized the best of what the other person had to offer and had chosen to value it as well. (644)
Wasn’t friendship its own miracle, the finding of another person who made the entire lonely world seem somehow less lonely? (650)
…had spent most of his time childishly protecting his privacy… (663)
“You were treated horribly. You came out on the other end. You were always you.” (689)
The Ambitious Years. The Insecure Years. The Glory Years. The Delusional Years. The Hopeful Years. (691)
You don’t visit the lost, you visit the people who search for the lost. (744)
“No,” Willem said, after they’d all stopped laughing. “I know my life’s meaningful because”-and here he stopped, and looked shy, and was silent for a moment before he continued-“because I’m a good friend. I love my friends, and I care about them, and I think I make them happy.” (779)
He wasn’t so elderly after all, I saw: probably just a few years older than I. And yet I was never able (and am still not) to think of myself as old. I talked as if I knew I was; I bemoaned my age. But it was only for comedy, or to make other people feel young. (798)
I slipped the disc into the computer and heard his voice, and although I would have cried anyway for its beauty, I cried more because it was his. (813)
To conceive of such a luxury, you needed an American mind. (32)
Opposite Willem that afternoon is a Thom Gunn poem: “Their relationship consisted/ In discussing if it existed.” Underneath, someone has written in black marker, “Don’t worry man I can’t get no pussy neither.” He closes his eyes. (44)
How did you know that it was time to give up? Was it when you were thirty-eight and still hadn’t found an agent? Was it when you were forty and still had a roommate and were making more as a part-time waiter than you had made the year you decided to be a full-time actor? Was it when you got fat, or bald, or got bad plastic surgery that couldn’t disguise the fact that you were fat and bald? When did pursuing your ambitions cross the line from brave into foolhardy? How did you know when to stop? In earlier, more rigid, less encouraging (and ultimately, more helpful) decades, things would be much clearer: you would stop when you turned forty, or when you got married, or when you had kids, or after five years, or ten years, or fifteen. And then you would go get a real job, and acting and your dreams for a career in it would recede into the evening, a melting into history as quiet as a briquette of ice sliding into a warm bath. (48)
They bragged of what they would be doing if they hadn’t gone into this wretched industry: they’d be a curator (possibly the one job where you’d make even less than you did now), a sommelier (well, make that two jobs), a gallery owner (make it three), a writer (all right, four-clearly none of them were equipped to make money, ever, in any imagining). (65)
…whom Malcolm had begin to think of as not so much black but pre-black, as if blackness, like nirvana, was an idealized state that he was constantly striving to erupt into. (68)
At his age, the only truly important aspects of one’s identity were sexual prowess; professional accomplishments; and money. (71)
…every day it became more and more remote, until it was just a memory, and so was she, a beloved character from a book he’d read long ago. (123)
The standard interpretation of the first line was “I am lost to the world,” but he read it as “I have become lost to the world,” which, he believed, was less self-pitying, less melodramatic, and more resigned, more confused. I have become lost to the world/ In which I otherwise wasted so much time. (125)
And in that way, law school breaks a mind down. Novelists, poets, and artists don’t often do well in law school (unless they are bad novelists, poets, and artists), but neither, necessarily, do mathematicians, logicians, and scientists. The first group fails because their logic is their own; the second fails because logic is all they own. (188)
“And I didn’t even really like her,” Willem had told him in one of their phone calls. “I did it for the worst reason of all-because I was bored.”
He had considered this. “No,” he said, “the worst reason of all would’ve been because you were trying to be cruel. Yours was just the stupidest reason of all.” (440)
He was always, always trying to decide how he should be-if his thoughts should be of acceptance or of escape. (613)
He now viewed a successful relationship as one in which both people had recognized the best of what the other person had to offer and had chosen to value it as well. (644)
Wasn’t friendship its own miracle, the finding of another person who made the entire lonely world seem somehow less lonely? (650)
…had spent most of his time childishly protecting his privacy… (663)
“You were treated horribly. You came out on the other end. You were always you.” (689)
The Ambitious Years. The Insecure Years. The Glory Years. The Delusional Years. The Hopeful Years. (691)
You don’t visit the lost, you visit the people who search for the lost. (744)
“No,” Willem said, after they’d all stopped laughing. “I know my life’s meaningful because”-and here he stopped, and looked shy, and was silent for a moment before he continued-“because I’m a good friend. I love my friends, and I care about them, and I think I make them happy.” (779)
He wasn’t so elderly after all, I saw: probably just a few years older than I. And yet I was never able (and am still not) to think of myself as old. I talked as if I knew I was; I bemoaned my age. But it was only for comedy, or to make other people feel young. (798)
I slipped the disc into the computer and heard his voice, and although I would have cried anyway for its beauty, I cried more because it was his. (813)