“They don’t want people to know what it was like before the operation. They want to keep you hating yourselves. Otherwise, it’s too easy to get used to ugly faces, normal faces.”
“Is it really such a big deal for a boy to look like his father? Which is typical butthead thinking, because of course it’s a big deal, if your father happens to be in prison.”
“Self-deprecation is another characteristic of the oppressed, which derives from their internalization of the opinion of the oppressors hold of them. So often do they hear that they are good for nothing, know nothing and are incapable of learning anything – that they are sick, lazy, and unproductive – that in the end they become convinced of their own unfitness.”
“And Paula never, ever, gives me the impression that I am ugly and once when I said something of the kind she went off like a bomb. ‘You get no sympathy from me on that score, my lover.‘”
“When you don’t have to hide anymore, even years from now, there’ll always be some small part of you whispering, ‘I don’t deserve this. I didn’t fight for it. I’m not worth it.’ And you are, Luke, you are. You’re smart and funny and nice, and you should be living life, instead of being buried alive in that old house of yours.”