I wish I were stronger and more secure in myself so that I could really spend my life with a guy like Lenny. Because he has a different kind of strength than Joshie. He has the strength of his sweet tuna arms. He has the strength of putting his nose in my hair and calling it home. He has the strength to cry when I go down on him. Who IS Lenny? Who DOES that? Who will ever open up to me like that again? No one. Because it's too dangerous. Lenny is a dangerous man. Joshie is more powerful, but Lenny is much more dangerous.
Gary ShteyngartI just want fiction to remain a vital force for entertainment and not just for contemplation. Both things can exist.
Gary ShteyngartThen I celebrated my Wall of Books. I counted the volumes on my twenty-foot-long modernist bookshelf to make sure none had been misplaced or used as kindling by my subtenant. โYouโre my sacred ones,โ I told the books. โNo one but me still cares about you. But Iโm going to keep you with me forever. And one day Iโll make you important again.โ I thought about that terrible calumny of the new generation: that books smell.
Gary ShteyngartAlso, I've spent an entire week without reading any books or talking about them too loudly. I'm learning to work my apparat's screen, the colourful pulsating mosaic of it, the fact that it knows every last stinking detail about the world, whereas my books only know the minds of their authors.
Gary Shteyngart