How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
I had no brain left, no wit, no pride, no itch, no smart, it was as if the membrane of my past had collected like a dead skin to be skimmed away. (5.41)
Despite his absolute exuberance just hours ago, Rojack is right back down in the dumps. For a while, he felt like he was in control of things, like he was in the driver's seat—but now that the cops are closing in, Rojack feels the same sense of paralyzing hopelessness that's crippled him for so long.
Quote #8
Civilisation is the successful if imperfect theft of […] these secrets, and the price we have paid is to accelerate our private sense of some enormous if not quite definable disaster which awaits us. (5.376)
This is some pretty heavy stuff, right? Interestingly, this passage seems to reveal Rojack's—and perhaps Mailer's—understanding of the dissatisfaction at the core of the modern experience. To Rojack, this unhappiness is due to the denial of fundamental truths about oneself. Now if only he could apply that knowledge to his own life…
Quote #9
And the dread I had escaped […] now flew in silent as the shadow of a bat, and my body was like a cavern where deaths are stored. (7.119)
It always happens the same way: First, Rojack does something crazy (either violent or sexual) and feels better, but then, in the next moment, he feels worse out of nowhere. If the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, then Rojack belongs in the loony bin.