Date: 1777

Attempts at gaiety may look like "a conquest over the natural pensiveness of [the] mind"

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1796

"Anxious to authorise the presence of his dangerous guest, yet conscious that her stay was infringing the laws of his order, Ambrosio's bosom became the theatre of a thousand contending passions."

— Lewis, Matthew Gregory (1775-1818)

Date: 1796

"The fact was, that the different sentiments with which education and nature had inspired him, were combating in his bosom: it remained for his passions, which as yet no opportunity had called into play, to decide the victory."

— Lewis, Matthew Gregory (1775-1818)

Date: 1922

"Tonight deftly amid wild drink and talk, to pierce the polished mail of his mind."

— Joyce, James (1882-1941)

Date: 1949-1952, 1953

"Hard, hard work, excavating and digging, mining, moling through tunnels, heaving, pushing, moving rock, working, working, working, working, working, panting, hauling, hoisting. And none of this work is seen from the outside. It's internally done. It happens because you are powerless and unable t...

— Bellow, Saul (1915-2005)

Date: 1992

"No doubt suicide would turn out to be the violent preface to yet another span of nauseating consciousness, of diminishing spirals and tightening nooses, and memories like shrapnel tearing all day long through his flesh."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 2000

"This is after all the heart of the matter, the place where everything -- not without difficulty, not without civil war, not without nailing down my tongue and drawing over it the serrated knife of one thing after another, not without learning to thank my torturers because it's been such a growth...

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: July 23, 2012

"I'm O.K., you tell them, but with each passing week the depression deepens. You try to describe it. Like someone flew a plane into your soul. Like someone flew two planes into your soul."

— Díaz, Junot (b. 1968)