Big Machine Quotes

“A little style is a good thing, but you can’t trust a person who won’t be ugly in front of you.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Doubt is the big machine. It grinds up the delusions of women and men.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Empathy is what separates human beings from teenage boys.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Some people act like it’s a sign of weakness if you want to belong, but I think most human beings yearn to find at least one open door in their lifetime.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“No matter where you go, poor people have the capacity to endure. Some people even compliment us on it, as if endurance is all we can achieve.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“It’s easier to hold onto a bad idea if you never share it, and it’s harder to defend one if you let it out.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“The poor aren't defeated. We're domesticated.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“The ancient Egyptians believed the god Anubis met each of us on the other side, and that he stood before a great scale on which our hearts were set. There each was weighed, tested, for its worth.
Was this the heart I wanted measured?”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Oppression doesn’t make people noble. Give any of us a little comfort, and we’ll kill to keep it. The despised become despicable.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“People hear that you grew up religious, and they can’t imagine you’d have a complex relationship with faith. If you believe one part, you must believe it all. But who gets more chances to see the absurdities than the devout? An answer that’s satisfying on Sunday becomes contradictory by Wednesday night. Belief is a wrestling match that lasts a lifetime.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“I don’t have much faith in institutions, but I still believe in people.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“There are people who say life is dull. Just a series of mundane events. But I can’t agree. Things happen. Bet on that.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“The success of any society must be judged by the life of its worst off. No other calculation will do.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“I’m always looking for the monster. Not even just in horror. I want them in everything. Just give me the monsters. Logical conclusions don’t satisfy. Monsters satisfy, absolutely.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Time alone is pornography for people with families.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Before September 11, the skinny, jittery black guy made security think one thing: drug mule. But after the attacks, security only cared about bombs. So it was the Arab guys, the Puerto Ricans and Indians, even white men, that got searched. I was too dark to make people worry on a plane. Still caused fear in elevators.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Fuck the meek. The despised will inherit the earth!”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Don’t focus on the mishaps; consider the pleasures instead.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“The shame wasn't in discovering that she had a price; everyone had one of those. Maybe it was just in learning, so concretely, that this was what she cost.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Think of King Jesus as our greatest doubter. Who saw the order of society and taught us to defy it. Who saw the ugly urges in ourselves and taught us to resist them. As we navigate through the powerful tides, doubt is our rudder.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“I don’t know what to say about the hygiene of the male species.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Human beings are no damn good,” he said. “We are even worse than animals. We like ...”
He trailed off, cleared his throat, but his voice hardly reached a whisper.
“We like monsters,” he said.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“You find that people come up with an entire history based on that one fact. They assume the worst about you. This is true if you have a criminal past, absolutely, but even if you just had an usual childhood, people will look at you crooked. Long before my drug problems, I’d learned not to admit my history to strangers. I used to go through all the rigmarole of explaining my background to anyone who’d listen. Really trying to make a case that I was normal. But when I got older, I realized I was basically begging others to think better of me, and you can’t beg people to treat you with respect. Either they choose to do it or you go around them. Don’t waste time dignifying fools. So”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“It’s frightening to step into a place and understand you’re a victim. I’m not talking about a bad feeling or a vague sense. I mean knowing. A quick fire runs through your heart and limbs. You go stiff because you’re aware something’s about to happen, but you can’t think clearly enough to escape.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“Seeing America by bus is like touring the Louvre in a Porta Potti.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“This was one benefit of being a grown man and not a kid: I wanted to impress this woman, but not to the point of getting myself killed.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“A little style is a good thing, but you can't trust someone who won't be ugly in front of you.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“And you can fool yourself if you’re raised in New York. Think that somehow your birthplace alone makes you cosmopolitan. But it isn’t true. We’re rubes too.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“The face of goodness may surprise you.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine

“They wouldn’t speak to me. They wouldn’t look at me. And yet if I’d gotten out of that chair, if I’d tried to leave the room, those women would’ve bopped me in the head with hammers. If I wasn’t willing to be a father, I better damn sure be a witness at least.”
― Victor LaValle, Big Machine