But let us not forget that cities are like human beings. They are born, they go through childhood and adolescence, they grow old, and eventually they die
Elif SafakRead
Part of me always felt like the other, the outsider, the observer. My father had two sons with his second wife, who I didn't meet until my late 20s. I was always on the periphery. In Madrid, I was the only Turk in a very international school, so I had to start thinking about identity. All these things affected me.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects on feelings of being an outsider and how experiences shape one's identity.
Elif Safak's quote illustrates the complex emotions involved in navigating one's identity amidst feelings of exclusion. Her experiences—being the only Turk in an international school and having a different family dynamic—contributed to her sense of being an outsider, reflecting the broader challenges many face in understanding their place in a diverse world.
Themes
IdentityOutsiderExperienceBelongingFamily
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a discussion about the importance of understanding diverse identities at a cultural seminar.
More from Elif Safak
All quotes →I like to question cultural biases wherever I go, and I question Islamophobia as much as I question anti-western sentiment because I think all extremist ideologies are very similar.
Elif SafakRead
Stories cannot demolish frontiers, but they can punch holes in our mental walls, and through those holes we can get a glimpse of the other and sometimes even like what we see.
Elif SafakRead
What i’m saying is, my friends, one ought to be able to let go. If a path does not please us, instead of insisting on going that specific way, of making our selfishness the guide, we ought to forsake. The books we cannot write, the films we cannot shoot, the projects we cannot develop, the jobs we cannot pursue and the people who no longer love us. Being able to let go, at times, is the most beautiful of all!
Elif SafakRead
For me, writing stories is one way of feeling connected to the universe and God.
Elif SafakRead
I write as if I were drunk. It is a process of intuition rather than placing myself above my story like a puppeteer pulling strings. For me, it's a scary, chaotic process over which I have little control. Words demand other words, characters resist me.
Elif SafakRead
Similar quotes
I don't feel I was 'born American,' but my homeland was denied to me after the end of World War II, and I craved something I could identify with. When I became a student at Harvard in the 1950s, America very quickly filled the vacuum. I felt I was American, but I think it's more revealing of America how quickly others here accepted me.
Zbigniew BrzezinskiRead
I always assumed that my otherness was a curse - that I would be held back by my Asian and queer identities.
Eugene Lee YangRead
When everyone at school is speaking one language, and a lot of your classmates' parents also speak it, and you go home and see that your community is different -there is a sense of shame attached to that. It really takes growing up to treasure the specialness of being different.
Sonia SotomayorRead
When you go through all your life processing and abusing your hair so it will look like the hair of another race of people then you are making a statement and the statement is clear
Assata ShakurRead
It's ironic that no matter where I go, I meet people from Brooklyn. I'm proud of that heritage. It's where I'm from, who I am.
Howard SchultzRead
The truth is, for me, when I was a young black girl who knew I was different, was watching TV, I would always be staring at the TV set looking for myself, and I didn't see me. And when you don't see yourself, you start to think that you don't matter, or you start to think that something is wrong with you.
Lena WaitheRead