“She took a sort of abject pride in her mercilessness toward herself.^[1]

In a document from his 2002 syllabus titled “Your Liberal-Arts $ at Work,” David Foster Wallace breaks down 5 common word usage mistakes in English.

1946

bitter irony via the monkey’s paw

super amused that in holland the title of the book translates to, “anne frank is alive and lives in the attic.”  i mean, why beat around the bush i guess.

cowan ave. police station, c. 1925

"What if you believed that everything in life was like a prize? What if you thought of the world as a big random drawing, and you were always winning things, the world offering them up with a big grin, like an emcee’s: Here you go, Hollis. Here is a motorcycle. Here is a little boy who loves you. Here is a weird experience, here is something bad that you should mull over because it will make you a better person. What if you could think that life was this free vacation you’d won, and you won just because you happened to be alive?"

Dan Chaon, “Passengers, Remain Calm” from Among the Missing

"My heart started racing, not the bad kind of heart racing, like, I’m about to die. But the good kind of heart racing, like, Hello, can I help you with something? If not, please step aside because I’m about to kick the shit out of life."

Bernadette Fox
Maria Semple, Where’d You Go, Bernadette