The poor aren't defeated. We're domesticated. Victor LaValle More Quotes by Victor LaValle More Quotes From Victor LaValle Our family suffers from a hereditary condition called, generally, mental illness. Specifically, multiple family members in successive generations have suffered from either bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. Victor LaValle mentalmental-illnessbipolarfamily There are times when I need to dig up the diagram for a type of satellite dish, for instance, but I just can't seem to phrase this need correctly. As a result, I'm inundated by advertising for satellite television and people's online customer reviews of such services when, in fact, I was only trying to figure out what a certain component is called. Victor LaValle customerresultadvertisingpeople 'Dark Gods,' T. E. D. Klein's book of four novellas, felt like a godsend - even if it came from a deformed god, one that lurked beneath our sidewalks. Victor LaValle likegoddarkbook You can't write a story about a mental hospital in the United States without facing the grand example of 'Cuckoo's Nest.' Victor LaValle hospitalwithoutstoryyou Lumpy and lazy; I aspired to lethargy. In the second year of university, I missed half my classes just because I couldn't pull myself out of bed. Victor LaValle just-becausemyselfuniversitylazy I have a very intimate knowledge of the world of the mentally ill and of life inside of, especially, public hospitals and the way people are treated in there and the way that they try to survive in there. Victor LaValle lifepeopleworldknowledge I had a pretty bad time when I was an undergraduate at Cornell University. I failed out of school. I was much, much heavier. Victor LaValle baduniversitytimeschool Fear warps our understanding of reality and even our ability to see reality clearly. Victor LaValle seeunderstandingfearreality The devil that stayed with me most vividly was the one from the cover of Iron Maiden's 'Number of the Beast' album. Victor LaValle mebeastirondevil I've spent my life visiting a handful of people who are very close to me when they've been committed to one hospital or another in New York. Victor LaValle my-lifemelifepeople Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' was a story about the fear of immigration; the bad old bloodsucker swooping in from Eastern Europe and also preying upon 'our' vulnerable women. Victor LaValle storybadwomenfear I like America, where believers eddy around each other like currents of air. Even our atheists are devout! To be an American is to be a believer. I don't have much faith in institutions, but I still believe in people. Victor LaValle faithbelieveamericapeople The profession is never going back to those days when a handful of wealthy people treated publishing like a hobby: one where the business can lose money because the family has lots of it to burn. Frankly, I don't think that model was ever sustainable, and it really only enriched a small number of writers. Victor LaValle familymoneybusinesspeople I know that many authors say editors don't edit anymore, but that's not been true in my experience. Victor LaValle truesayknowexperience Try imagining James Joyce not writing about being a Catholic. Victor LaValle abouttrybeingwriting It's tough to write beautifully about ugly things, but Mitchell S. Jackson makes it look easy. Victor LaValle lookuglytougheasy Since Queens is the most ethnically diverse plot of land on Earth, we had tenants from all over the globe. The whole world in one building. Victor LaValle buildinglandearthworld For as long as I could remember, the person in E23 pasted the same Halloween decoration, a witch with a giant wart on her crone's nose, but whenever kids rang, the tenant wouldn't answer. At first, kids figured they'd just missed the guy: bad timing. But it seemed impossible that all of us missed him every year. Victor LaValle badimpossiblerememberlong I was dressed like Darth Vader. Vader was my man, even with the villainy. He wore all black and had a deep voice; he reminded me of my uncle. I had a cheap mask-cape combo, the kind available at any pharmacy during October. Victor LaValle deepmemanblack I weighed 25 stone, and I didn't stand nine feet tall, so the weight didn't sit well on me. As big as a house? No. I was as big as an estate. Victor LaValle standstonemefeet
