Once you hear something, you can never return to the time before you heard it.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOEROnce you hear something, you can never return to the time before you heard it.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERWhat does it remember like?
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERShe had fallen in love so many times that she began to suspect she was not falling in love at all, but doing something much more ordinary.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERPart of living your life is an awareness of the opportunities that can be missed and an awareness that time moves in one direction.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI looked at everyone and wondered where they came from, and who they missed, and what they were sorry for.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI felt, that night, on that stage, under that skull, incredibly close to everything in the universe, but also extremely alone.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERFeeding my children is not like feeding myself: it matters more.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERNot responding is a response–we are equally responsible for what we don’t do. In the case of animal slaughter, to throw your hands in the air is to wrap your fingers around a knife handle.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERWords never mean what we want them to mean.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI dreamt four nights ago of clock hands descending from the universe like rain, of the moon as a green eye, of mirrors and insects, of a love that never withdrew. It was not the feeling of completeness that I so needed, but the feeling of not being empty.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERThere are still many different ways to get stuck, existentially stuck. Feeling like, “This is worthless. I’m wasting my time, and I would be wasting the time of someone who tried to read this.” It happens all the time.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI want an infinitely blank book and the rest of time.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERI tried the key in all the doors, even though he said he didn’t recognize it. It’s not that I didn’t trust him, becuase I did. It’s that at the end of my search I wanted to be able to say: I don’t know how I could have tried harder.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERThe world is a big place,” he said, “but so is the inside of an apartment!
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERJust to be a functioning adult in the world, we develop all of these layers of protection. When we see homeless people, we don’t cry, even though homeless people probably deserve our tears – you know, it’s a horrible thing.
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOERIt made me start to wonder if there were other people so lonely so close. I thought about “Eleanor Rigby.” It’s true, where do they all come from? And where do they all belong?
JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER