Siri Hustvedt Quotes

On the stem of memory imaginations blossom.

Memory is a snare, pure and simple; it alters, it subtly rearranges the past to fit the present.

I love that the idea of examining memory, and the way memory is edited was made more interesting because it was being filtered through a writer.

Memory feeds imagination.

We don't only tell stories when we set out to tell stories, our memory tells us stories. That is, what we get to keep from our experiences is a story.

I'm interested in memory because it's a filter through which we see our lives, and because it's foggy and obscure, the opportunities for self-deception are there. In the end, as a writer, I'm more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened.

My remembrance of the past is a novel I am constantly recomposing; and it would not be a historical novel, but sheer fiction, if the material events which mark and ballast my career had not their public dates and characters scientifically discoverable.

Memory, in my opinion, is a complete noodle. It hangs on the silliest things but forgets the stuff that really matters.

Memory is a gulf that a word can move to its lowest depths.

Memory is, of course, a trickster.

Memory... is an internal rumor.

I've learned that memories can have a physical, almost living presence.

Why did happy memories fade and blur until one could scarcely recall them at all, while horrible memories seemed to retain their blinding clarity and painful sharpness?

Certain things I remember exactly as they were. They are merely discolored a bit by time, like coins in the pocket of a forgotten suit. Most of the details, though, have long since been transformed or rearranged to bring others of them forward. Some, in fact, are obviously counterfeit; they are no less important. One alters the past to form the future.

Why do people have memories? It would be easier to die - anything to stop remembering.

The good thing about painting from memory is that so much is forgotten.

Memory itself is an internal rumour.

Memory is the basis of every journey.

Memory is a fascinating trickster. Words and images have enormous power and can easily displace actual experience over the years.

Memory is corrupted and ruined by a crowd of memories. If I am going to have a true memory, there are a thousand things that must first be forgotten. Memory is not fully itself when it reaches only into the past. A memory that is not alive to the present does not remember the here and now, does not remember its true identity, is not memory at all. He who remembers nothing but facts and past events, and is never brought back into the present, is a victim of amnesia.

The autobiographical self is built on the basis of past memories and memories of the plans that we have made; it's the lived past and the anticipated future.

I fell victim to the temptation of every autobiographer, to the illusion that since the past exists only in one's memories and the words which strive vainly to encapsulate them, it is possible to create past events simply by saying they occurred.

Sometimes I think the only memories I have are those that I’ve created around photographs of me as a child. Maybe I’m creating my own life. I distrust any memories I do have. They may be fictions, too.

Memory is a wonderful thing if you don't have to deal with the past.

there simply is no way to describe the past without lying. Our memories are not like fiction. They are fiction.