The Italian Teacher Quotes

“Nobody likes to be understood without warning.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“What’s there to say about making paintings?” He looks hard at his son. “My real life, it’s when I’m working. It’s entirely there. The rest—everything—is flimflam. And that’s tragedy. Because what am I really doing? Wiping colors across fabric? Tricking people into feeling something’s there, when it’s nothing? When I’m doing the work, I almost think it adds up. Then they drag me to some farce like tonight, and I’m reminded what my job really is: goddamn decoration.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“How amazing my mother and father were! All those years, all their bullying doubts, all in the paltry hope that strangers might someday stand before their work and look, probably no longer than a few seconds. That’s all they were fighting for.

What driven lives!”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“Can I take your hand with me?"
"I'm afraid not, it's become too attached to me."
"I feel the same way.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“The indolent and the industrious cannot stay friends.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“Careerists always salute those who lack ambition.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“But he finds solidarity here, linking himself with all those quiet types who looked upon blank surfaces with expectation, those who mark objects to erase themselves, who dissolve in the bliss of work. Pinch raises his brush, leans forward on the balls of his feet, floorboards creaking. From the corner of his eye: all these painterly tools, a kaleidoscope of colors, his companions. Is that tragedy? That the peaks of my life are entirely inside? Other people - those I so craved - mattered far less than it seemed. Or is this what I pretend? As the tide of sadness flows closer, he returns to work, misplacing himself there, though it’s his own image taking shape before him.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“Alone, he inches up the entrance stairs, struggles for the house key in a tight pocket, and makes it inside his flat, the dogs snuffling his trouser legs. He can’t even crouch to pat them. He stands there, cringing to recall an hour ago. So pathetic, still trying at this age, like the last middle-aged man on the dance floor. That, he decides, was my final attempt. Enough. Enough of other people. All I need is my cottage: Disappear there, stay within the borders of a canvas. That is my company.”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“When young, Pinch considered human connections the refuge of those who couldn’t make art. Or is art just the refuge of those who cannot connect?”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher

“Your father, who can’t string together a sentence in French or Spanish or Catalan, gabs with everybody around here, while you—man of a million languages—have no interest in speaking to anyone!”
― Tom Rachman, The Italian Teacher