“ In August of 2002, I survived a car accident. Although I can still see the van speeding toward us, I cannot bring to mind the crash itself - only its aftermath. Siri Hustvedt
“ As one of four daughters, I grew up with an imaginary brother - wondering what it would have been like if one of us had been a boy. There's no question that there was a phantom boy child in my imagina… Siri Hustvedt
“ There is no reason we should expect young children to enter the nocturnal darkness of sleep and dreams without help. Siri Hustvedt
“ It's hard to penetrate characters who are very cut off and lack empathy and to do it with sympathy. It's so easy to make a damaged character repugnant. Siri Hustvedt
“ Because I knew so much about him, because I had been close to him, I couldn't bring the various fragments of my experience with him into a single coherent image. The truth was mobile and contradictory… Siri Hustvedt
“ If something's not working, it's wonderful to have a reader you can trust to say, 'Actually, you've gone off the deep end here'. Siri Hustvedt
“ The English expression 'to fall asleep' is apt because the transition between waking and sleeping is a gradual drop from one state of being into another: a giving up of full self-consciousness for unc… Siri Hustvedt
“ Each person does see the world in a different way. There is not a single, unifying, objective truth. We're all limited by our perspective. Siri Hustvedt
“ I am always suspicious of those who impose 'rules' on child rearing. Every child is different in terms of temperament and learning, and every parent responds to a particular child, not some generalize… Siri Hustvedt
“ The idea that skiing might not be fun, might not be for everyone, had never occurred to me. Where I come from, the sport signified pleasure, nature, family happiness. Siri Hustvedt
“ Creativity has always depended on openness and flexibility, so let us hope for more of both in the future. Siri Hustvedt
“ Henry Miller is a famous writer whose work has fallen out of fashion, but I strongly recommend that readers who don't know his work pick up a book and experience this writer's zealous, crazy, inventiv… Siri Hustvedt
“ Most of us accept that although we may believe our dreams to be real events, upon waking, we can tell the difference between nocturnal hallucinations and reality. Siri Hustvedt
“ All human states are organic brain states - happiness, sadness, fear, lust, dreaming, doing math problems and writing novels - and our brains are not static. Siri Hustvedt
“ But all attractions are alike,' he said. 'They come from an emptiness inside.' He hammered on this chest with his index finger. 'Something's missing and you have to fill it. Books, paintings, people,… Siri Hustvedt
“ New York City is the place where people come to invent, reinvent, or find the room they need to be who they wish to be. Siri Hustvedt
“ I said very little. I knew that for the time being I was the open air, the place to put the words, not a real interlocutor. And then, ekthout a transition of any kind, she began to tell me .... {p. 13… Siri Hustvedt
