Note: This is a post from a few years ago. As I am now also writing my “memoirs” with the Hamilton series, I thought it would be a good time to bring back Anais. She is am amazing writer and truth-teller.
I’m reading Anais Nin’s 1947-1955 unexpurgated diaries called “Trapeze.” That’s what I am doing.
Anais Nin is high level. Anais Nin is a dangerous writer. Anais Nin is fucking excellent. Here is a little bit:
“One handles the truth like dynamite. Literature is one vast hypocrisy, a slant, deception, treachery. All the writers have concealed more than they have revealed.”
“My father died mad. He did not understand what happened to him. I want my suffering to be useful. I want the novel to teach life. I want the novel to accomplish what the analyst does.”
“Great lovers never trust each other.”
And…
“The diary cannot ever be published.”
So that’s it. I’m reading Anais Nin.