“I don't believe in God as a kind father in the sky. I don't believe that the meek will inherit the earth: The meek get ignored and trampled. They decompose in the bloody soil of war, of business, of art, and they rot into the warm ground under the spring rains. It is the bold, the loud-mouthed, the cruel, the vital, the revolutionaries, the mighty in arms and will, who march over the soft patient flesh that lies beneath their cleated boots.”

Unabridged Journals, Sylvia Plath

“It seems almost an incredible relief to know that there is someone outside oneself who is not happy all the time. We must be at low ebb when we are this far into the black: that everyone else, merely because they are 'other', is invulnerable. That is a damn lie.”

Unabridged Journals, Sylvia Plath

“Let's face it, I am in danger of wanting my personal absolute to be a demigod of a man, and as there aren't many around, I often unconsciously manufacture my own. And then, I retreat and revel in poetry and literature where the reward value is tangible and accepted. I really do not think deeply, really deeply. I want a romantic nonexistent hero.”

Unabridged Journals, Sylvia Plath

“Eagerly I wished the morrow; --vainly I
had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow--
sorrow for the lost Lenore--
For the rare and radiant maiden whom
the angels name Lenore--
Nameless here for evermore.”

The Raven, Edgar Allan Poe Recommended by Tabitha.

“One by one
Only the good die young
They're only flying too close to the sun
And life goes on
Without you.”

No One But You, Queen Recommended by Zoe.

“I didn't forge the mind of man. Your precious God did that. Cramming it full of rancor and bloodlust . Like Zeus, thrusting all those winged demons, into the tiny confines of Pandora's box. Don't hate me just because I turn the key, and let them loose. 'Fly, my darlings, fly! All the way to heaven, till you burst the clouds, and blacken the sun!'”

Quills [movie]

“Where do we go from here?
The words are coming out all weird
Where are you now, when I need you.”

The Bends, Radiohead Recommended by holly.

“If you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world on his shoulders, if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater the effort the heavier the world bore down upon his shoulders -- what would you tell him to do?

I...don't know. What...could he do? What would you tell him?

To shrug.”

Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand

“The rotter who simpers that he sees no difference between the power of the dollar and the power of the whip, ought to learn the difference on his own hide -- as, I think, he will. Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips, and guns -- or dollars. Take your choice -- there is no other -- and your time is running out.”

Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand

“No, you can't ruin an architect by proving that he's a bad architect. But you can ruin him because he's an atheist, or because somebody sued him, or because he slept with some woman, or because he pulls wings off bottleflies. You'll say it doesn't make sense? Of course it doesn't. That's why it works. Reason can be fought with reason. How are you going to fight the unreasonable? The trouble with you, my dear, and with most people, is that you don't have sufficient respect for the senseless. The senseless is the major factor in our lives. You have no chance if it is your enemy. But if you can make it become your ally -- ah, my dear!”

The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand

“There will be days when a bus driver snaps at you as you enter a bus, and he'll be only asking for a dime, but that won't be what you'll hear; you'll hear that you're nothing, that he's laughing at you, that it's written on your forehead, that thing they hate you for.”

The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand

“Oh it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you
Oh such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
You just keep me hanging on.”

Perfect Day, Lou Reed Recommended by Sophie.

“What was it about that night?
Connection, in an isolating age
For once, the shadows gave way to light
For once, I didn't disengage.”

Rent

“I only came in here to inquire the way to the nearest cinema. I am a respectable woman, une femme convenable, on her way to the nearest cinema. Faites comme les autres -- that's been my motto all my life. Faites comme les autres, damn you.

And a lot he cares -- I could have spared myself the trouble. But this is my attitude to life. Please, please, monsieur et madame, mister, missis and miss, I am trying so hard to be like you. I know I don't succeed, but look how hard I try. Three hours to choose a hat; every morning an hour and a half trying to make myself look like everybody else. Every word I say has chains round its ankles; every thought I think is weighted with heavy weights. Since I was born, hasn't every word I've said, every thought I've thought, everything I've done, been tied up, weighted, and chained? And, mind you, I know that with all this I don't succeed. Or I succeed in flashes only too damned well. . . . But think how hard I try and how seldom I dare. Think -- and have a bit of pity. That is, if you ever think, you apes, which I doubt.

Now the waiter has finished telling me how to get to the nearest cinema.

'Another Pernod,' I say.”

Good Morning, Midnight, Jean Rhys

“But as we were running and she was changing-- as if she was losing her physical form through the sheer speed of transformation-- develop, fix, varnish-- she rose above her circumstances -- Oxford, 1859, my rooms above the old library-- and became part of the ether-- and I rose out of mine. We were playing a higher game, above the confines of who we were-- no longer the pale stutterer, the stooped and dessicated Mr. Dodgson and a little girl with hair falling into her eyes-- but two beings changing and fluttering above the earth.”

Still She Haunts Me, Katie Roiphe

“'D'you know what happens when you hurt people?' Ammu said. 'When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That's what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.'”

The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy

“I'm just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody else's. I'm sick of everybody that wants to get somewhere, do something distinguished and all, be somebody interesting. It's disgusting.”

Franny And Zooey, J.D. Salinger

“Incidentally, did you hear her last week? She went on at beautiful length about how she used to fly all around the apartment when she was four and no one was home. The new announcer is worse than Grant - if possible, even worse than Sullivan in the old days. He said she surely just dreamt that she was able to fly. The baby stood her ground like an angel. She said she knew she was able to fly because when she came down she always had dust on her fingers from touching the light bulbs.”

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters, J.D. Salinger

“Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behaviour. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them—if you want to. Just as some day, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry”

The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger

“Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.”

The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger

“I used to think she was quite intelligent in my stupidity. The reason I did was because she knew quite a lot about the theatre and plays and literature and all that stuff. If somebody knows quite a lot about those things, it takes you quite a while to find out whether they're really stupid or not.”

The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger

“You take somebody that cries their goddam eyes out over phoney stuff in the movies, and nine times out of ten they're mean bastards at heart.”

The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger

“I crave broken men.”

I Don't Want To Be Crazy, Samantha Schutz

“Daddy?
That's another kind of prison.
It's not the prince at all,
but my father
drunkenly bent over my bed,
circling the abyss like a shark....”

Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty), Anne Sexton

“Even so, I must admire your skill.
You are so gracefully insane.”

Elegy In The Classroom, Anne Sexton