Eventually you stop paying attention to your own feelings when there’s nothing to be done about them.

BEN MARCUS

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Eventually you stop paying attention to your own feelings when there’s nothing to be done about them.

Ben Marcus

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Feelings

To me one of the amazing technologies of writing is the way it can listen in on thoughts. I don’t feel that that’s natural to other art forms in the same way.

BEN MARCUS

To me one of the amazing technologies of writing is the way it can listen in on thoughts. I don’t feel that that’s natural to other art forms in the same way.
BEN MARCUS

Feel
The common, the quotidian, is so much more unyielding to me, really stubborn and hard to work with, and I like this because it makes me think and it makes me worry. I can’t just plunge my hand into the meat of it. I need new approaches.
BEN MARCUS
I like big doses of grief when I read: Richard Yates, Flannery O’Connor, Kenzabaro Oe, Thomas Bernhard.

BEN MARCUS

I like big doses of grief when I read: Richard Yates, Flannery O’Connor, Kenzabaro Oe, Thomas Bernhard.
BEN MARCUS

Bigs Dose
The context of what can be known establishes that love and indifference are forms of language, but the wise addition of punctuation allows us to believe that there are other harms – the dash gives the reader the clear signal they are coming.

BEN MARCUS

The context of what can be known establishes that love and indifference are forms of language, but the wise addition of punctuation allows us to believe that there are other harms – the dash gives the reader the clear signal they are coming.
BEN MARCUS

Dash Establish Indifference Language
Judaism to me, as badly as I practiced it, what I’ve always loved about it was its total embrace of complexity, its admission of unknowability.
BEN MARCUS

Complexity Judaism
In certain strains of Judaism, there’s a profound passion for the ineffable. Contemplation of God is meant to be forever elusive, because, you know, our tiny minds can’t possibly comprehend Him. If we find ourselves comprehending Him, then we can be sure we’re off track.

BEN MARCUS

In certain strains of Judaism, there’s a profound passion for the ineffable. Contemplation of God is meant to be forever elusive, because, you know, our tiny minds can’t possibly comprehend Him. If we find ourselves comprehending Him, then we can be sure we’re off track.
BEN MARCUS

Profound
I love the way dates in a text make us think that truth will follow.
BEN MARCUS

Way
Among other things, autoimmune disorders are an induction into a world of unstable information and no reliable expertise.

BEN MARCUS

Among other things, autoimmune disorders are an induction into a world of unstable information and no reliable expertise.
BEN MARCUS

Disorder
RHETORIC The art of making life less believable; the calculated use of language, not to alarm but to do full harm to our busy minds and properly dispose our listeners to a pain they have never dreamed of.
BEN MARCUS

Calculate Language
Suspense left my life a long time ago, now it has returned. I do not care for it.
BEN MARCUS

Long Suspense
I’m an enormous fan of Thomas Bernhard’s books, and I like the relentless feeling in his work – the pursuit of darkness, the negative – and I think in some sense I’ve internalised that as what one is supposed to do.
BEN MARCUS
Being with him was like being alone underwater – everything was slow; nothing counted; I could not be harmed; I would feel dry and cold when I resurfaced.
BEN MARCUS

Being Like Underwater
Fiction is too complicated and too elusive to break down into a set of tricks.

BEN MARCUS

Fiction is too complicated and too elusive to break down into a set of tricks.
BEN MARCUS

Breaking Down
It’s lonely to listen to the pleasure of others, not that I’ve made a habit of that kind of eavesdropping. There’s joy and passion in the next room, in the next bed, but it’s not yours.

BEN MARCUS

It’s lonely to listen to the pleasure of others, not that I’ve made a habit of that kind of eavesdropping. There’s joy and passion in the next room, in the next bed, but it’s not yours.
BEN MARCUS
A misspelled word is probably an alias for some desperate call for aid, which is bound to fail.

BEN MARCUS

A misspelled word is probably an alias for some desperate call for aid, which is bound to fail.
BEN MARCUS

Failing Language
My goal, with whatever I’m working on, is to lose track of time.
BEN MARCUS

Goal Loses

Eventually you stop paying attention to your own feelings when there’s nothing to be done about them.

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