Jaena Rae > Jaena Rae's Quotes

“How easy it was to lie to strangers, to create with strangers the versions of our lives we imagined.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“I'm chasing you. I'm going to chase you until you give this a chance.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“How was it possible to miss something you no longer wanted?”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“You know it was love at first sight for both of us," he said.
"For both of us? Is it by force? Why are you speaking for me?"
"I'm just stating a fact. Stop struggling."
...
"Yes, it's a fact," she said.
"What?"
"I love you.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“She liked that he wore their relationship so boldly, like a brightly colored shirt. Sometimes she worried that she was too happy. She would sink into moodiness, and snap at Obinze, or be distant. And her joy would become a restless thing, flapping its wings inside her, as though looking for an opening to fly away.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“It’s strange how I have felt, with every major event that has occurred in my life, that you were the only person who would understand.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“She heard his words like a melody and she felt herself breathing unevenly, gulping at the air. She would not cry, it was ridiculous to cry after so long, but her eyes were filling with tears and there was a boulder in her chest and a stinging in her throat. The tears felt itchy. She made no sound. He took her hand in his, both clasped on the table, and between them silence grew, an ancient silence that they both knew. She was inside this silence and she was safe.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“It seemed so natural, to talk to him about the odd things. She had never done that before. The trust, so sudden and yet so complete, and the intimacy, frightened her.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“How was it possible to miss something you longer wanted? Blaine needed what she was unable to give and she needed what he was unable to give, and she grieved this, the loss of what could have been.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“He reminded her of Obinze’s expression for people he liked. Obi ocha. A clean heart.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“Each memory stunned her with its blinding luminosity. Each brought with it a sense of unassailable loss, a great burden hurtling towards her, and she wished she could duck, lower herself so that it would bypass her, so that she would save herself. Love was a kind of grief. This was what the novelists meant by suffering. She had often thought it a little silly, the idea of suffering for love, but now she understood.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“They said “soon” to each other often, and “soon” gave their plan the weight of something real.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Americanah

“Literature not only illuminated another’s experience, it provided, I believed, the richest material for moral reflection. My brief forays into the formal ethics of analytic philosophy felt dry as a bone, missing the messiness and weight of real human life.”
― Paul Kalanithi, When Breath Becomes Air

“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, who had ever been alive.”
― James Baldwin

“How many times can summer turn to fall in one life?”
― Charles Wright

“Remember then: there is only one time that is important-- Now! It is the most important time because it is the only time when we have any power. The most necessary man is he with whom you are, for no man knows whether he will ever have dealings with any one else: and the most important affair is, to do him good, because for that purpose alone was man sent into this life!”
― Leo Tolstoy, What Men Live by and Other Tales

“Google can bring you back 100,000 answers. A librarian can bring you back the right one.”
― Neil Gaiman