3 Quotes by Magdalena Tulli

The hand resting on the banister feels beneath its fingers the old chipped enamel. It is in this way that everyday thoughts are recovered. These are for the most part small and hard morning thoughts that contain the tiniest possible questions or no questions whatsoever. They hide in clothing, in objects, in furniture, differently from evening thoughts, whose sharp little needles are stuck beneath skulls for memory’s sake.

The world of silence that endures inside the stones and the bricks, a world devoid of thoughts, feelings or desires, astounds and frightens them. And life without desires seems even more unbearable than the life without fulfillments that is experienced every day by many an inhabitant of the city.

Past events leave traces in the memory like an ax chopping wood. Chips fly; they remain where they fall even after the wood has been used to light the stove.