“A person probably couldn't live without pride. But living by pride, alone the prospects were too dark. Way too dark.”

“The hurt is in the act of possession: we are too small in mind and body to possess another person without pride or to be possessed without humiliation.”

“And it’s more. It’s about getting past that question of whatswrong with me, to knowing there’s nothing wrong, that you were bornthis way. You're a normal person and a beautiful person and youshould be proud of who you are. You deserve to live and live with dignityand show people your pride.”

“Life is too short. It's too precious. We have to live in this world, but we don't have to wallow in it. We don't have to fill our lives with all of this darkness.”

“These boys, now, were living as we'd been living then, they were growing up with a rush and their heads bumped abruptly against the low ceiling of their actual possibilities. They were filled with rage. All they really knew were two darknesses, the darkness of their lives, which were now closing in on them, and the darkness of the movies, which had blinded them to that other darkness, and in which they now, vindictively, dreamed, at once more together than they were at any other time, and more alone.”

“You can't love a person who lives that way without fearing him too. Maybe even hating him a littele”