Quote by William Gay

“Somewhere deep inside, his humanity had been shaken by something so unnatural, so foreign in its essence, his very being withdrew from it...”

— Tamara Rose Blodgett

“He was perpetually on guard against the ways that abstract thinking (especially thinking about your own thinking) can draw you away from something more…

— James Ryerson

“He liked to think of himself as a merciless vivisector probing into the palpitating entrails of his own soul.”

— Aldous Huxley

“He began to have a dim feeling that, to attain his place in the world, he must be himself, and not another.”

— W.E.B. Du Bois

“He composed himself inwardly. Sparing the world his awkwardness, hiding vulnerability. Preserving his pride.”

— Julie Anne Long

“The original in man is that which articulates him from the very outset upon something other than himself.”

— Charles Olson

“And he reflected that one cannot completely become his own self until one is completely among others.”

— Milan Kundera

“He’d come to war to see abstractions become realities. Instead he’d seen the reverse. Everything was abstract now.”

— Denis Johnson

“He was wondering at the unreality of ideas, at the fading radiance of existence, and at the little absorptions that were creeping avidly into…

— F Scott Fitzgerald

“he had turned unfathomability into an art form. He attacked everything in life with a mixture of extraordinary genius and naïve incompetence and it…

— Douglas Adams

“He has the look of a mighty mind, whose thoughts spin hidden beneath the impassive surface.”

— Rae Carson

“And he felt dubious and discontented suddenly, and wondered whether he was really and truly successful as a human being.”

— E. M. Forster