Tropic of Capricorn

order to be born again an individual.

You have to be wiped out as a human being in or

First you have to be crushed, to have your conflicting points of view annihilated.

when I think of what I hoped to encompass, I pat myself on the back, I give myself a double A. I am proud of the fact that I made such a miserable failure of it; had I succeeded I would have been a monster.

was a crushing defeat, but it put iron in my backbone and sulphur in my blood. I knew at least what it was to fail.

write and write and write, even if everybody in the world advises you against it, even if nobody believes in you.

Be firm! Be hard! they cautioned me. Fuck that! I said to myself, I'll be generous, pliant, forgiving, tolerant, tender.

From childhood on I can see myself on the track of this spectre, enjoying nothing, desiring nothing but this power, this ability.

was like kicking the bottom out of a bucket

Nobody can estimate the results of a good deed, of a kind word