Quotes From "The Room" By Hubert Selby Jr.

Time has to pass. But sometimes its so goddamn long. Sometimes it just seems to drag and drag and weigh a ton. And hang on you like a monkey. Like its going to suck the blood out of you. Or squeeze your guts out. And sometimes it flies. And is gone somewhere, somehow, before you know it was even here. As if time is only here to make you miserable. That's the only reason for time. To squeeze you. Crush you. To tie you up in knots and make you fucking miserable. . Hubert Selby Jr.

Her skirt was nice, but she was wearing a dull-colored blouse that wasn't at all attractive. I'd have to remember to tell her not to wear it when she was with me if the two of us were going to get together, I thought Jonas Karlsson

But there was something different about this bout of crying. It was calm, facyual crying. Good crying. Water cleansing the tubes, rather like clearing a gutter of leaves and pine needles. A way to get rid of negative energy and make room for something better. It was as if I could feel all the improper thoughts flying away, and new ones taking their place. Better ones. A fresh start. Jonas Karlsson

Stupid people don’t always know that they’re stupid. They might be aware that something is wrong, they might notice that things don’t usually turn out the way they imagined, but very few of them think it’s because of them. That they’re the root of their own problems, so to speak. And that sort of thing can be very difficult to explain. Jonas Karlsson

He looked at me with the tired, ignorant, slightly stupid expression that is so common in people who aren't used to seeing the broader picture in small things. Jonas Karlsson