Susanna Kaysen

it is easy to slip into a parallel universe. There are so many of them: worlds of the insane, the criminal, the crippled, the dying, perhaps of the dead as well.

Every window on Alcatraz has a view of San Francisco.

Why did she do it? Nobody knew. Nobody dared to ask.

We might get out sometime, but she was locked up forever in that body.

more dangerous things, like putting a gun in your mouth. But you put it there, you taste it, it’s cold and greasy, your finger is on the trigger, and you find that a whole world lies between this moment and the moment you’ve been planning, when you’ll pull the trigger. That world defeats you. You put the gun back in the drawer. You’ll have to find another way.

“Just because I don’t sleep doesn’t mean I don’t rest.”

“There’s nobody to take care of you out there.”

“I’m not sad,” she explained to me, “but I can’t help crying”

“Daisy committed suicide yesterday.”

Suicide is a form of murder—premeditated murder. It isn’t something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes getting used to. And you need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind.