Elfriede Jelinek

“Every day, I have to make the decision whether I should do something about my depression or just keep sleeping.”

“The woman is the loser in the patriarchal society, but she is also a collaborator.”

“Power is the most interesting thing in the world.”

“The secret of a good relationship is to understand that you have to give and take. And you're the one who has to give.”

“Language is a skin: I rub my language against the other. It is as if I had words instead of fingers, or fingers at the tip of my words.”

“Austria is a country of artists, but not of art.”

“Time is a monster that cannot be reasoned with. It responds like a snail to our impatience, then it races like a gazelle when you can't catch your breath.”

“Art is always an exaggeration.”

“For me, the theatre is a place of confrontation.”

“I have no sense of what's mainstream. I don't know what it is.”

“I don't have a story. I have a language.”

“When one is a woman, when one is a feminist, when one is a lesbian, when one is a Jew, one has a right to be all that. But when one is a communist, it is a problem.”

“I am a person who has always been protected. I have always been taken care of. I have never had to do anything for myself.”

“What is the point of literature if it doesn't say what needs to be said?”