Adults, waiting for tomorrow, move in a present behind which is yesterday or the day before yesterday or at most last week: they don't want to think about the rest. Children don't know the meaning of yesterday, or even of tomorrow, everything is this, now: the street is this, the doorway is this, the stairs are this, this is Mamma, this is Papa, this is the day, this is the night.

— Elena Ferrante

Although she was fragile in appearance, every prohibition lost substance in her presence.

— Elena Ferrante

As a result of subduing the forces of nature with the tools that we invent, we find ourselves today at the point where the force of our tools has become a greater concern than the forces of nature.

— Elena Ferrante

At the ponds that evening I said to Antonio: "It's always been like that, since we were little: everyone thinks she's bad, and I'm good." He kissed me, murmuring ironically, "Why, isn't that true?" That response touched me and kept me from telling him that we had to part. It was a decision that seemed to me urgent, the affection wasn't love, I loved Niño, I knew I would love him forever. I had a gentle speech prepared for Antonio, I wanted to say to him: It's been wonderful, you helped me a lot at a time when I was sad, but now school is starting and this year is going to be difficult, I have new subjects, I'll have to study a lot; I'm sorry, but we have to stop. I felt it was necessary and every afternoon I went to our meeting at the ponds with my little speech ready. But he was so affectionate, so passionate, that my courage failed, and I put it off.

— Elena Ferrante

A woman's body does a thousand different things, toils, runs, studies, fantasizes, invents, wearies, and meanwhile the breasts enlarge, the lips of the sex swell, the flesh throbs with a round life that is yours, your life, and yet pushes elsewhere, draws away from you, although it inhabits your belly, joyful and weighty, felt as a greedy impulse and yet repellent, like an insect's poison injected into a vein.

— Elena Ferrante

...but I was bored, I could scarcely understand them. I started to borrow novels from the circulating library, and read one after the other. But in the long run they didn't help. They presented intense lives, profound conversations, a phantom reality more appealing than my real life. So, in order to feel as if I were not real, I sometimes went...

— Elena Ferrante

But one afternoon Lila said softly that there was nothing that could eliminate the conflict between the rich and the poor. "Why?"" Those who are on the bottom always want to be on top, those who are on top want to stay on top, and one way or another they always reach the point where they're kicking and spitting at each other."" That's exactly why problems should be resolved before violence breaks out."" And how? Putting everyone on top, putting everyone on the bottom?"" Finding a point of equilibrium between the classes."" A point where? Those from the bottom meet those from the top in the middle?"" Let's say yes."" And those on top will be willing to go down? And those on the bottom will give up on going any higher?"" If people work to solve all problems well, yes. You're not convinced?"" No. The classes aren't playing cards, they're fighting, and it's a fight to the death.

— Elena Ferrante

Certainly something had happened to me during the night. Or after months of tension I had arrived at the edge of some precipice, and now I was falling, as in a dream slowly, even as I continued to hold the thermometer in my hand, been as I stood with the soles of my slippers on the floor, even as I felt myself solidly contained by the expectant looks of my children. It was the fault of the torture that my husband had inflicted. But enough, I had to tear the pain from memory, I had to sandpaper away the scratches that were damaging my brain.

— Elena Ferrante

Don't be timid. You're a writer, use your role, test it, make something of it. These are decisive times, everything is turning upside down. Participate, be present.

— Elena Ferrante

Don’t be timid. You’re a writer, use your role, test it, make something of it. These are decisive times, everything is turning upside down. Participate, be present. And begin with the scum in your area, put their backs to the wall.

— Elena Ferrante