"Every human being is trying to say something to others. Trying to cry out I am alive, notice me! Speak to me! Confirm that I am important, that I matter!!"

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I think you will agree that I am alive in every part of this book; turn back twenty, thirty, one hundred pages - I am back there. That is why I hate the story; characters are not snakes that they must shed their skins on every page - there can only be one action: what a man is. When you have understood this, you will be through with novels.

— Kenneth Patchen