Bret Easton Ellis famous quotes

Where there was nature and earth, life and water, I saw a desert landscape that was unending, resembling some sort of crater, so devoid of reason and light and spirit that the mind could not grasp it on any sort of conscious level and if you came close the mind would reel backward, unable to take it in. It was a vision so clear and real and vital to me that in its purity it was almost abstract. This was what I could understand, this was how I lived my life, what I constructed my movement around, how I dealt with the tangible.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Real #Light #Water

No one ever likes the right person.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Likes #Persons #Right Person

Is evil something you are? Or is it something you do?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Evil

I keep feeling that people are becoming less human and more animalistic. They seem to think less and feel less so that everyone is operating on a very primitive level. I wonder what you and I will see in our lifetimes. It seems so hopeless yet we must keep on trying ... I guess we can't escape being a product of the times, can we?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Thinking #People #Feelings

Why was I holding on to something that would never be mine? But isn't that what people do?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#People #Holding On

Sex is mathematics. Individuality no longer an issue. What does intelligence signify? Define reason. Desire - meaningless. Intellect is not a cure. Justice is dead.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sex #Issues #Justice

The better you look, the more you see.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Nightlife #Looks

But this was what happened when you didn't want to visit and confront the past: the past starts visiting and confronting you.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Karma #Past #Want

I like the idea of a writer being haunted by his own creation, especially if the writer resents the way the character defines him.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Character #Ideas #Way

All of my books come from pain.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Pain #Book

I had all the characteristics of a human being—flesh, blood, skin, hair—but my depersonalization was so intense, had gone so deep, that my normal ability to feel compassion had been eradicated, the victim of a slow, purposeful erasure. I was simply imitating reality, a rough resemblance of a human being, with only a dim corner of my mind functioning
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Reality #Compassion #Hair

Life is like a typographical error: we're constantly writing and rewriting things over each other.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Writing #Errors #Life Is Like

He was simply someone who floated through our lives and didn't seem to care how flatly he perceived everyone or that he'd shared our secret failures with the world, showcasing the youthful indifference, the gleaming nihilism, glamorizing the horror of it all.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Secret #Nihilism #World

Why would I care what other people are thinking? I don't care what an audience thinks of me.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Thinking #People #Care

...there is an idea of a Patrick Bateman, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me, only an entity, something illusory, and though I can hide my cold gaze and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable: I simply am not there.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Real #Hands #Ideas

People are afraid to merge.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#People

Adjust my dreams for me.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Dream

That's how I became the damaged party boy who wandered through the wreckage, blood streaming from his nose, asking questions that never required answers. That's how I became the boy who never understood how anything worked. That's how I became the boy who wouldn't save a friend. That's how I became the boy who couldn't love the girl.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Love #Girl #Party

but I don't want to wear a condom because I don't feel anything," and she says calmly... glaring at me,"If you don't use one you're not going to feel anything anyway.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Use #Want #Condom

People just... disappear," he says. "The Earth just opens up and swallows people," I say, some what sadly, checking my Rolex. "Eerie." Kimball yawns, stretching. "Really eerie." "Ominous." I nod my agreement. "It's just"- he sights, exasperated- "futile.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sight #Agreement #Eerie

But... what about us? What about the past?" she asks blankly. "The past isn't real. it's just a dream," I say. "Don't mention the past.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Dream #Real #Past

What keeps me interested--and it always does--is how can she be a bad actress on film but a good one in reality?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Reality #Doe #Actresses

Look how black the sky is, the writer said. I made it that way.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sky #Black #Way

Hip," I murmur, remembering last night, how I lost it completely in a stall at Nell's---my mouth foaming, all I could think about were insects, lots of insects, and running at pigeons, foaming at the mouth and running at pigeons.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Running #Night #Thinking

I come to a red light, tempted to go through it, then stop once I see a billboard sign that I don’t remember seeing and I look up at it. All it says is 'Disappear Here' and even though it’s probably an ad for some resort, it still freaks me out a little and I step on the gas really hard and the car screeches as I leave the light.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Light #Car #Red

Rock 'n' roll. Deal with it.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Rocks #Rock N Roll #Deals

We buy balloons, we let them go.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Balloons

Women aren't very bright," Rip says. "Studies have been done.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Rip #Done #Study

Disappear Here. The syringe fills with blood. You're a beautiful boy and that's all that matters. Wonder if he's for sale. People are afraid to merge. To merge.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Beautiful #Boys #Blood

My pain is constant and sharp...this confession has meant nothing
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Pain #Confession #Constant

And," Price adds, smiling, "if another round of Bellinis comes within a twenty-foot radius of our table we are going to set the maitre d' on fire. So you know, warn him.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Fire #Feet #Twenties

I wasn't acting on passion. I was simply acting.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Passion #Acting

No one will ever know anyone. We just have to deal with each other. You're not ever gonna know me.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Deals #Know Me

Price. You're priceless.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Priceless

How could she ever understand that there isn't any way could be disappointed since I no longer find anything worth looking forward to?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Way #Looking Forward #Disappointed

The numbing lists of things you were supposed to have as an American to make you happy, which ultimately, of course, don't. Those aren't the things that make you happy.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Lists #Make You Happy

Do you wear a diaphragm everywhere you go?' I want to scream, but stop myself because the idea really excites me.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Ideas #Want #Scream

And it struck me then, that I liked Sean because he looked, well, slutty. A boy who had been around. A boy who couldn't remember if he was Catholic or not.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sex #Boys #Catholic

There are no more barriers to cross. All I have in common with the uncontrollable and the insane, the vicious and the evil, all the mayhem I have caused and my utter indifference toward it I have now surpassed. My pain is constant and sharp and I do not hope for a better world for anyone, in fact I want my pain to be inflicted on others. I want no one to escape, but even after admitting this there is no catharsis, my punishment continues to elude me and I gain no deeper knowledge of myself; no new knowledge can be extracted from my telling. This confession has meant nothing.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Pain #Punishment #Evil

She laughs and looks out the window and I think for a minute that she's going to start to cry. I'm standing by the door and I look over at the Elvis Costello poster, at his eyes, watching her, watching us, and I try to get her away from it, so I tell her to come over here, sit down, and she thinks I want to hug her or something and she comes over to me and puts her arms around my back and says something like 'I think we've all lost some sort of feeling.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Eye #Thinking #Doors

Disintegration---I'm taking it in stride.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Lazy #Stride

And though the coldness I have always felt leaves me, the numbness doesn't and probably never will. this relationship will probably lead to nothing... this didn't change anything. I imagine her smelling clean, like tea...
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Numbness #Tea #Imagine

I want to take you away from this," I say, motioning around the kitchen, spastic. "From sushi and elves and... STUFF.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Kitchen #Want #Sushi

I feel like I'm not smart enough to answer the questions I'm asked.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Smart #Answers #Enough

My pain is constant and sharp, and I do not hope for a better world for anyone.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Pain #World #Constant

I am gripped by an existential panic.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Panic #Existential

Exploitation is a harsh word, I know that, but on a certain level, to me that is the central Hollywood story.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Hollywood #Stories #Levels

Hope E.L .James doesn't think I'm being a prankster. I really want to adapt her novels for the screen. Christian Grey is a writer's dream.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Christian #Dream #Thinking

I had dreamed of something so different from what reality was now offering up, but that dream had been a blind man's vision. That dream was a miracle. The morning was fading. And I remembered yet again that I was a tourist here.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Dream #Morning #Reality

Are you as much of a criminal if you don't act when there's a crime taking place in front of you as you are one of the participants? That was something that I was thinking about a lot because there are many moments in 'Less Than Zero' where horrific things happen and Clay could do something about them, but his passivity stops him.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Zero #Thinking #Clay

I had no idea that 'Less Than Zero' was going to be read by anyone outside of Los Angeles, and it's - believe me, as the writer of the book I'm somewhat amused and intrigued by the idea that 25 years later it's still out and people are still reading it.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Zero #Believe #Book

History is sinking and only a very few seem dimly aware that things are getting bad.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sinking

Greed is good. Sex is easy. Youth is forever
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sex #Greed #Forever

I totally relate to Tom Cruise. He's not crazy, it's just the litany of the mid-life crisis.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Crazy #Cruise #Crisis

Writing a novel is not method acting and I find it easy to step out of it at cocktail hour.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Drinking #Writing #Acting

I convinced myself I hadn't seen anything, ... I had done this many times before ... I was adept at erasing reality.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Reality #Done

Not being able to find meaning can be just as powerful as finding meaning,
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Powerful #Able #Find Me

I want to moan and writhe with you and I want to go up to you and kiss your mouth and pull you to me and say "I love you I love you I love you" while stripping. I want you so bad it stings.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Love You #Kissing #Want

I don't want to care. If I care about things, it'll just be worse, it'll just be another thing to worry about. It's less painful if I don't care.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Worry #Care #Want

Everyone I know who is successful has issues with their father, regardless of whether it was sports or business or entertainment.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Sports #Father #Successful

Every book for me is an exorcism in some way or another, working through my feelings at the time.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Book #Feelings #Way

I do not feel I have a legacy to protect.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Legacy #Protect #Feels

I don't know why I write what I write.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Writing

I have no problems or issues with screenwriting in general.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Issues #Problem #Screenwriting

I think basically most men are misogynistic.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Men #Thinking

I think my sensibility is very literary; all my books were built as books, and I wasn't thinking about them being movies.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Book #Thinking #Sensibility

I went to college in Vermont, and then stayed in the East Coast.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#College #East #Vermont

I think a lot of snowflakes are alike...and I think a lot of people are alike too.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Thinking #People #Snowflake

Our lives are not all interconnected. That theory is a crock. Some people truly do not need to be here.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#People #Needs #Theory

A child should never even think about being a "good son." A parent decides that fate for the child. The parent encourages that. Not the child himself. And the "perfect dad"? I shudder at thinking what that may be.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Dad #Children #Fate

I've forgotten who I had lunch with earlier, and even more important, where.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Lunch #Important #Forgotten

I laugh maniacally, then take a deep breath and touch my chest- expecting a heart to be thumping quickly, impatiently, but there's nothing there, not even a beat.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Heart #Laughing #Take A Deep Breath

I'm into, oh murders and executions mostly. It depends.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Execution #Murder

I like to dissect girls. Did you know I'm utterly insane?
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Girl #Insane

So…” Kimball looks at his book helplessly. “There’s nothing you can tell me about Paul Owen?” “Well.” I sigh. “He led what I suppose was an orderly life, I guess. “ Really stumped, I offer, “He...ate a balanced diet.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Book #Looks #Sigh

She sits before me, sullen but hopeful, characterless, about to dissolve into tears. I squeeze her hand back, moved, no, touched by her ignorance of evil. She has one more test to pass. Do you own a briefcase?” I ask her, swallowing.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Ignorance #Hands #Evil

There’s no use in denying it: this has been a bad week. I’ve started drinking my own urine.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Drinking #Use #Week

I tried to make meat loaf out of the girl but it becomes too frustrating a task and instead I spend the afternoon smearing her meat all over the walls, chewing on strips of skin I ripped from her body
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Girl #Wall #Skins

When we sat down to eat I took inventory of the people in the room, and the remnants of my good mood evaporated when I realized how very little I had in common with them – the career dads, the responsible and diligent moms – and I was soon filled with dread and loneliness. I locked in on the smug feeling of superiority that married couples give off and that permeated the air – the shared assumptions, the sweet and contented apathy, it all lingered everywhere – despite the absence in the room of anyone single at which to aim this.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Mom #Sweet #Couple

I could stay living in this city if they just installed Blaupunkts in the cabs.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Cities #Cab

I stare into a thin, web-like crack above the urinal's handle and think to myself that if I were to disappear into that crack, say somehow miniaturize and slip into it, the odds are good that no one would notice I was gone. No... one... would... care. In fact some, if they noticed my absence, might feel an odd, indefinable sense of relief. This is true: the world is better off with some people gone. Our lives are not all interconnected. That theory is crock. Some people truly do not need to be here.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Thinking #Odds #People

Yes. Yes I am. I am a completely demented misogynist.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Demented

I'm on the verge of tears by the time we arrive at Pastels since I'm positive we won't get seated but the table is good, and relief that is almost tidal in scope washes over me in an awesome wave.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Tears #Relief #Tables

But this road doesn't go anywhere,” I told him. “That doesn't matter.” “What does?” I asked, after a little while. “Just that we're on it, dude,” he said.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Doe #Littles #Matter

I have all the characteristics of a human being: blood, flesh, skin, hair; but not a single, clear, identifiable emotion, except for greed and disgust. Something horrible is happening inside of me and I don't know why. My nightly bloodlust has overflown into my days. I feel lethal, on the verge of frenzy. I think my mask of sanity is about to slip.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Thinking #Hair #Blood

I have to return some videotapes
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Return #Psycho

The seals stupidly dive off rocks into swirling black water, barking mindlessly. The zookeepers feed them dead fish. A crowd gathers around the tank, mostly adults, a few accompanied by children. On the seals' tank a plaque warns: COINS CAN KILL——IF SWALLOWED, COINS CAN LODGE IN AN ANIMAL'S STOMACH AND CAUSE ULCERS, INFECTIONS AND DEATH. DO NOT THROW COINS IN THE POOL. So what do I do? Toss a handful of change into the tank when none of the zookeepers are watching. It's not the seals I hate——it's the audience's enjoyment of them that bothers me.
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Children #Hate #Animal

Do you know what Ed Gein said about women?" [...] "'When I see a pretty girl walking down the street I think two things. One part of me wants to take her out and talk to her and be real nice and sweet and treat her right.'" I stop finish my J&B in one swallow. "What does the other part of him think?" Hamlin asks tentatively. "What her head would look like on a stick
-- Bret Easton Ellis

#Girl #Sweet #Real