Best Gary Shteyngart Quotes
- freedom is anathema to dreams nurtured in captivity. Anathema
- She took my hand and pulled me after her, her shoulders giving off a sweet peppermint concoction that the bodies of young women sometimes produce… Bodies
- Life for young American college graduates is a festive affair. Free of having to support their families, they mostly have gay parties on rooftops where… Affair
- We are now part of this giant machine where every second we have to take out a device and contribute our thoughts and opinions. Contribute
- I have my own dying empire to contend with, and I do not wish for any other. Any
- Every returning New Yorker asks the question: Is this still my city? I have a ready answer, cloaked in obstinate despair: It is. And if… All
- We know summer is the height of of being alive. We don't believe in God or the prospect of an afterlife mostly, so we know… Afterlife
- ... I'm the fortieth-ugliest man in this bar. But so what! So what! What if someday she lets me kiss each one of her freckles… All
- Do not throw away your heart. Keep your heart. Your heart is all that matters ... Throw away your ancestors! ... Throw away your shyness… Accept
- I wish I were stronger and more secure in myself so that I could really spend my life with a guy like Lenny. Because he… Arms
- Remember this... develop a sense of nostalgia for something, or you'll never figure out what's important. Develop
- Reading is entering into the consciousness of another human being. Another Human
- That's what tyrants do, I guess. They make you covet their attention; they make you confuse attention for mercy. Attention
- By reading this message you are denying its existence and implying consent. Consent
- I felt the weakness of these books, their immateriality, how they had failed to change the world, and I didn't want to sully myself with… Anymore
- The fading light is us, and we are, for a moment so brief (...) beautiful. Beautiful
- If you stop thinking, if you stop wondering, you die. Die
- Summer is a Latvian chicken. We make foolish choices. We think we’re young again. We run with outstretched arms toward an object of love and… Air
- Reading is difficult. People just aren't meant to read anymore. We're in a post-literate age. You know, a visual age. How many years after the… Age
- The love I felt for her on that train ride had a capital and provinces, parishes and a Vatican, an orange planet and many sullen… Capital
- You could drown a kitten in her blue eyes. Blue
- My hair would continue to gray, and then one day, it would fall out entirely, and then, on a day meaninglessly close to the present… All
- In contravention of my belief that any life ending in death is essentially pointless, I needed my friends to open up that plastic bag and… Any
- Then I celebrated my Wall of Books. I counted the volumes on my twenty-foot-long modernist bookshelf to make sure none had been misplaced or used… Been
- I feel safe with him because he is so not my ideal and I feel like I can be myself because I'm not in love… Feel