The Story of a New Name (Neapolitan Novels #2)

by Elena Ferrante

For her whole life she would sacrifice to him every quality of her own, and he wouldn’t even be aware of the sacrifice, he would be surrounded by the wealth of feeling, intelligence, imagination that were hers, without knowing what to do with them, he would ruin them.

Is it possible that our parents never die, that every child inevitably conceals them in himself?

She settled herself to wait not far from me, and in a second I was imagining the two of us—models displayed in a catalogue—as we would appear to the eyes of Sarratore’s son the moment he came out the door.

Why, sooner or later, did I always find plausible excuses for those who made me suffer?

death seemed to her so assured that it took away her respect for everything, above all for herself, as if nothing counted anymore and everything deserved to be ruined.

I am what I am and I have to accept myself; I was born like this, in this city, with this dialect, without money; I will give what I can give, I will take what I can take, I will endure what has to be endured.

That people, even more than things, lost their boundaries and overflowed into shapelessness is what most frightened Lila in the course of her life.

I had imagined tears, confidences, talk, a wonderful morning of confessions and reconciliation. Instead here we were, walking arm in arm, she bundled up, dirty, scarred, I disguised as a young lady of good family.

her life was full of varied and foolish adventures as much as mine, and that time simply slipped away without any meaning, and it was good just to see each other every so often to hear the mad sound of the brain of one echo in the mad sound of the brain of the other.