As it is my good fortune to be American, I live in the only country that as a matter of policy is pro-Israel regardless of party allegiance; Democrats and Republicans equally unite behind the blue-and-white. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
In life, single women are the most vulnerable adults. In movies, they are given imaginary power. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I always knew I was a writer. And I always thought to myself, ‘Well, why not me?’ Someone has to be on the best-seller list, ‘Why not me?’ Someone has to write for the ‘New Yorker,’ ‘Why not me?’ And I didn’t really get much positive reinforcement as a kid, so I thought, ‘Well let me show you what I can do.’ – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Feminism is a good venue for getting yourself across as much as for getting your point across. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I am baffled by men. When they want me, I don’t want them; when I want them, they don’t want me. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Age is a terrible avenger. The lessons of life give you so much to work with, but by the time you’ve got all this great wisdom, you don’t get to be young anymore. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
That’s the thing about depression: A human being can survive almost anything, as long as she sees the end in sight. But depression is so insidious, and it compounds daily, that it’s impossible to ever see the end. The fog is like a cage without a key. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Yes, the United States is still the great meritocracy it’s always been; but now, if you aren’t brilliant or beautiful or both, there isn’t much to do, because they can do it cheaper in Shanghai or Mumbai. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I admire Bruce Springsteen because he’s a heroic person who has lots of integrity and has this incredible body of work that is so vital. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Everything good takes a great amount of effort. Like, things went wrong with ‘Prozac Nation’ so much, and it went through so many rejections and incarnations, but I felt so much that it needed to exist. But if I hadn’t been so persistent and insistent, it wouldn’t have happened. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Insanity is knowing that what you’re doing is completely idiotic, but still, somehow, you just can’t stop it. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Am I worried people will say I’m repeating myself? Sure. One thought I had was to publish it as a novel but eventually I just decided to do what I wanted to do. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I start to think there really is no cure for depression, that happiness is an ongoing battle, and I wonder if it isn’t one I’ll have to fight for as long as I live. I wonder if it’s worth it. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Sometimes I think that I was forced to withdraw into depression because it was the only rightful protest I could throw in the face of a world that said it was alright for people to come and go as they please, that there were simply no real obligations left. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I used to feel that I spent too much of my time in my pajamas doing nothing, and I’d think ‘in the time that I don’t spend writing, I could raise a family of five.’ In a lot of ways, being a writer is lonely and alienating. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I am motivated to write because it is what I am meant to do. It is not a choice – it is what I am. I did not choose writing – it chose me. And I believe it is necessarily that way. Anyone doing this for some other reason should not be. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Sometimes I wish that there were a way to let people know that just because I live in a world without rules, and in a life that is lawless, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hurt so bad the morning after. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I’ve calmed down. Looking back, I was engaged more in dramas than I was in relationships. I’ve spent a lot of my life being in it for the plot, and I don’t do that anymore. I’m satisfied. I’m not competing with myself. I accomplished things I wanted to do, so everything I do now is because I want to, not because I’m trying to prove something. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Why does the rest of the world put up with the hypocrisy, the need to put a happy face on sorrow, the need to keep on keeping on?… I don’t know the answer, I know only that I can’t. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
Some people just seem like they are up to no good. Like, in high school, I was a good student and got straight As. It was very strict, and you couldn’t do well there unless you studied very hard, but every time there was any trouble, I was the first person they would be talking to. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I always carry lots of stuff with me wherever I roam, always weighted down with books, with cassettes, with pens and paper, just in case I get the urge to sit down somewhere, and oh, I don’t know, read something or write my masterpiece. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I thought depression was the part of my character that made me worthwhile. I thought so little of myself, felt that I had such scant offerings to give to the world, that the one thing that justified my existence at all was my agony. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
My imagination, my ability to understand the way love and people grow over time, how passion can surprise and renew, utterly failed me. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I start to feel like I can’t maintain the facade any longer, that I may just start to show through. And I wish I knew what was wrong. Maybe something about how stupid my whole life is. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
I wish I were shyly, quietly intriguing, like Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, like someone French and fashionable who knows how to twirl her ladylike locks just so and walk adroitly on kitten heels, who is all gesture and whisper – but I am unfortunately forward and forthright: When I am interested in a man, he absolutely knows it. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
People who think that Sylvia Plath was a poor, sensitive poet are not getting that she had great amounts of ambition and anger that moved her along, or she wouldn’t have been able to fight against that depression to produce such an incredible body of work by the age of thirty. – Elizabeth Wurtzel
