Lorraine Teixeira

What kills hope, according to Byung-Chul Han, is not despair; on the contrary, despair is its starting point, the beginning of the journey. As he explains in the prelude to the book, the opposite of hope is fear.

Winston Churchill, a man who was very prone to depression, said: “If you are going through hell, keep going.” This advice implies that everything, the good and the bad, is temporary, like life itself.

Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores.

I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m . of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soo... See more