18 Quotes by Silvina Ocampo

Have you ever eaten flies?" Mendiondo asked."Yes, when I was a kid, on a dare. Of course, I tore off the wings and tiny legs before I ate it.

On the surface, there is no distinction between our experiences – some are vivid, others opaque; some are pleasant, others cause agony upon recollection – but there is no way of knowing which are dreams and which are reality.

How short life would be if certain unpleasant moments didn’t make it feel endless!

Writing is a luxury or, with luck, a rainbow of colors. It is my lifesaver when the water of the river or the sea tries to drag me under. When you want to die you fall in love with yourself, you look for something touching that will save you.

Houses dream they are boats at night.

When you write, everything is possible, even the very opposite of what you are.

Te amaba como si me pertenecieras, sin recordar que nadie pertenece a nadie, que poseer algo, cualquier cosa, es un vano padecimiento.

In a way, like Scheherazade to King Shahryar, I told stories to death so that it would spare my life and my images, stories that seemed to never end.

What matters is what we write: that is what we are, not some puppet made up by those who talk and enclose us in a prison so different from our dreams.