Then I repeated these words to my spirits: 'Leave me be; give me peace; and let me do the work of my life. I will never forget you.' Something about that incantation was particularly appealing to me. 'I will never forget you'-- as though one had to address the pride of the spirits, as though one wanted them to feel good about being exorcised.
Andrew SolomonI think an awful lot of the diplomatic problems that exist in the world come from people assuming that their society is the one with a purchase on truth.
Andrew SolomonI went through elementary school being bullied and teased. I remember someone - I can't recall his name, but I can see his face - who decided on the school bus, when I was ten or eleven, to call me "Percy." That was somehow supposed to connect to the fact that I wasn't very athletic. I was, in fact, also not very coordinated. I was not very masculine, by the standards of ten-year-olds. I remember being on the school bus and everyone chanting, "Percy! Percy! Percy!" at me.
Andrew SolomonPsychologically, I will not have to seek far if I decide to kill myself, because in my mind and heart I am more ready for this than for the unplanned daily tribulations that mark off the mornings and afternoons.
Andrew SolomonDepressed people cannot lead a revolution because depressed people can barely manage to get out of bed and put on their shoes and socks.
Andrew SolomonI've chronicled the experience of the mother of a transgender child who got attacked by the Ku Klux Klan in Tennessee, and that of a transgender woman who was asked to deliver a sermon at her Montana church and got a standing ovation from her congregation. The idea that Christianity is a blanket term that encompasses both of those attitudes seems ludicrous to me.
Andrew Solomon