Elif Batuman

Einstein had invented the atomic bomb, abused dogs, neglected his children.

Alfred Nobel hated mathematics and didn’t give the Nobel Prize to any mathematicians. There were many who were more deserving.”

obstructive sleep apnea

which was depriving her brain cells of oxygen

It was hard to feel cheerful when someone kept telling you you were a little fish in a big sea.

about people like my mother who passed the boards and became research faculty at second-tier schools, where they kept getting scooped by people at Johns Hopkins and Harvard.

it was even worse to know that there was one, and lots of people were in it—just not me. I dreamed about it almost every night

It would have been bad enough to be someplace where there were no orchestras, but it was even worse to know that there was one, and lots of people were in it—just not me. I dreamed about it almost every night.

She believed, and I did, too, that every story had a central meaning. You could get that meaning, or you could miss it completely.

how museums, which we thought of as the gateway to art, were actually the main agents of hiding art from the public.