4
" Am I clear? Am I making myself clear? And yet in Ischia I was happy, full of love. But it was no use, my head always finds a chink to peer through, beyond - above, beneath, on the side - where the fear is. In Bruno’s factory, for example, the bones of the animals cracked in your fingers if you merely touched them, and a rancid marrow spilled out. I was so afraid that I thought I was sick. But was I sick? Did I really have a murmur in my heart? No. The only problem has always been the disquiet in my mind. I can’t stop it, I always have to do, redo, cover, uncover, reinforce, and then suddenly undo, break. "
― Elena Ferrante , The Story of the Lost Child (The Neapolitan Novels #4)
18
" The depressed don’t write books. People who are happy write, people who travel, are in love, and talk and talk with the conviction that, one way or another, their words always go to the right place.”
“Isn’t that how it is?”
No, words rarely go to the right place, and if they do, it’s only for a very brief time. Otherwise they’re useful for speaking nonsense, as now. Or for pretending that everything is under control. "
― Elena Ferrante , The Story of the Lost Child (The Neapolitan Novels #4)