Katabasis

by R.F. Kuang

Though this was no surprise: academia respected discipline, rewarded effort, but even more, it adored genius that didn’t have to try.

“Hell’s lonely,” said Peter. “You’ll want company.” “Hell is other people, I’ve heard.”

Magick, the most mysterious and capricious of disciplines, admired for its power, derided for its frivolity, is in brief the act of telling lies about the world.

The trick of magick is to defy, trouble, or, at the very least, dislodge belief. Magick succeeds by casting confusion and doubt. Magick taunts physics and makes her cry.

Peter was always more interested in the problem than the answer. It made him a great scholar but so exhausting to work with.

“We only need to get down,” she told Peter. For one of them had to keep the cheer; one of them had to be delusional. This was the key to flourishing in graduate school. You could do anything if you were delusional. “I’m sure it’s very nice below.”

She relished the thought that her advisor might be harsh, impatient, even cruel to others—for that made his attentions to her worth all the more. She liked being the exception to the rule. Favoritism was well and fine if she was the favorite.

Deep down she suspected being in love just was two people lying to each other, concealing their violence,

With angry sulking men, the secret was holding your ground. You didn’t get rebellious, no—that was asking for a slap to the face. But you didn’t self-flagellate, either. When you acted like you ought to be whipped, that only confirmed to them that you should. One should never cower. The secret rather was to keep talking as if you deserved no punishment at all, and then to distract them with something they wanted more than they wanted to hurt you.

Wickedness felt better when you had a coconspirator; otherwise it was just you and your conscience.

The difference between greatness and mediocrity was only ever about following through.

She thought she’d learned to inhabit the impossible ideal: the girl who was eminently fuckable but unreachable, and therefore virtuous and perfect. The girl who was everything all at once.

wondered what it was like to exist so long that your practical identity was no longer hinged to a time or a place, but a question.