Books

11 Quotes From Eve Babitz That Will Convince You To Read Everything She's Ever Written

by Kerri Jarema

The writer Eve Babitz — whose books have been described as "dirty Joan Didion" — is one of literature's most underrated creatives. A veritable It Girl of the L.A. party scene in the '60s and '70s, Babitz may have been known for dallying with rock stars like Jim Morrison, but she also wrote seven books, including the novel Sex & Rage and the story collection Slow Days, Fast Company, both of which were reissued in recent years. And although her work — unflinching and often shocking looks at young womanhood, creativity, and life in California — display clear talent and creative bravery, she was never embraced like other writers of the time.

But Lili Anolik, author of Bustle Book Club's March pick, Hollywood's Eve: Eve Babitz and the Secret History of L.A., is trying to change all that. In 2012, Anolik tracked down Babitz, who had been living in virtual seclusion following a freak accident in the '90s. The Vanity Fair story that resulted — "All About Eve — And Then Some" — sparked interest in Babitz, and eventually led to Hollywood's Eve, which follows Babitz from her party-girl days to being discovered by Didion at age 30 to Babitz now, in her mid-70s, as her work is finally becoming recognized as essential of its time.

If you haven't yet picked up any Babitz's works, these 11 quotes below should be more than enough to convince you to add them — and Hollywood's Eve —to your TBR.

“It’s only temporary: you either die, or get better. — Something we used to say about life in general, feeling sophisticated and amusing in bars, back in the days when we thought how you behaved was the fault of other people.”

― Eve Babitz, Black Swans: Stories

“She figured that any day now she was going to start feeling the simple composure of normalcy that Jane Austen's heroines always sought to maintain, the state described in those days as 'countenance, and later as 'being cool.'”

― Eve Babitz, Sex & Rage: A Novel

“People go through life eating lamb chops and breaking their mother’s hearts.”

― Eve Babitz, Sex and Rage: A Novel

“She discovered what most writers insist is true nowadays, which is that they can only write for three hours a day at the most, so what else is there to do but drink?”

― Eve Babitz, Sex and Rage: A Novel

“In our romantic lives, these moments of jealousy, which scorch our lover’s initials into our flesh and seem to brand us, often vanish into thin air sooner or later."

― Eve Babitz, Black Swans: Stories

"She looked mean and stylish, as if she were supposed to be beautiful and you should take her word for it. From afar, she looked a lot better than close up. Sort of like America.”

― Eve Babitz, Black Swans: Stories

“I discovered there was something else I had never considered-Plan C- don't turn to mush, don't leave, stay and resist."

― Eve Babitz, Black Swans: Stories

“One summer morning while I was still a virgin though my virginity was on its last legs, I woke up and didn’t want to go to New Jersey."

― Eve Babitz, L.A. Woman

“She was sure she wasn’t ever going to go Hollywood, so she went.”

― Eve Babitz, L.A. Woman

“Secrets are lies that you tell to your friends.”

― Eve Babitz, Sex and Rage: A Novel

“He smelled like a birthday party for small children, like vanilla, crêpe paper, soap, starch, and warm steam and cigarettes.”

― Eve Babitz, Sex and Rage: A Novel