Actually, it was only part of myself I wanted to kill: the part that wanted to kill herself, that dragged me into the suicide debate and made every window, kitchen implement, and subway station a rehearsal for tragedy.

— Susanna Kaysen

All my integrity seemed to lie in saying No.

— Susanna Kaysen

An observer can’t tell if a person is silent and still because inner life has stalled or because inner life is transfixing busy.

— Susanna Kaysen

Are you crazy? It's a common phrase, I know. But it means something particular to me: the tunnels, the security screens, the plastic forks, the shimmering, ever-shifting borderline that like all boundaries beckons and asks to be crossed. I do not want to cross it again.

— Susanna Kaysen

Don’t ask me those questions! Don’t ask me what life means or how we know reality or why we have to suffer so much. Don’t talk about how nothing feels real, how everything is coated with gelatin and shining like oil in the sun. I don’t want to hear about the tiger in the corner or the Angel of Death or the phone calls from John the Baptist.

— Susanna Kaysen

Every window in Alcatraz has a view of San Francisco.

— Susanna Kaysen

Freedom was the price of privacy.

— Susanna Kaysen

If I could have any job in the world I'd be a professional Cinderella.

— Susanna Kaysen

Insanity comes in two basic varieties: slow and fast... Viscosity and Velocity are opposites, yet they can look the same. Viscosity causes the stillness of disinclination; velocity causes the stillness of fascination. An observer can't tell if a person is silent and still because inner life has stalled, or because inner life is transfixing busy.

— Susanna Kaysen

I think many people kill themselves simply to stop the debate about whether they will or they won't.

— Susanna Kaysen