Normal People by Irish author Sally Rooney is a 2018 novel, later adapted into a miniseries for Hulu. Set in contemporary Ireland, the story follows the entwined lives of Marianne Sheridan and Connell Waldron, the son of her family’s housekeeper—from their high school days in a small town in County Sligo to their years at Trinity College Dublin. Both characters are acutely intelligent and emotionally complex. Marianne is an outcast with strong opinions and a kind heart, while Connell is popular but self-conscious. Chronicling Marianne and Connell's relationship, Normal People offers a profound exploration of intimacy, insecurities, power dynamics, domestic abuse, the impact of social class on relationships, heartbreak, and personal growth.
Sally Rooney’s nuanced portrayal of human relationships and vulnerability speaks to the complexities of modern life, especially for young adults. Here are 30+ quotes from Normal People to reflect on.
The best quotes from Normal People on love and relationships
"All these years, they've been like two little plants sharing the same plot of soil, growing around one another, contorting to make room, taking certain unlikely positions."
"Being alone with her is like opening a door away from normal life and then closing it behind him."
"He has sincerely wanted to die, but he has never sincerely wanted Marianne to forget about him.”
"That's the only part of himself he wants to protect, the part that exists inside her."
"He often makes blithe remarks about things he 'wishes'. I wish you didn't have to go, he says when she's leaving, or: 'I wish you could stay the night.'"
"She has never believed herself fit to be loved by any person."
"I'm not a religious person but I do sometimes think God made you for me."
"No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, she thought, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not."
"She believes Marianne lacks 'warmth,' by which she means the ability to beg for love from people who hate her."
"There's always been something inside her that men have wanted to dominate, and their desire for domination can look so much like attraction, even love."
“Most people go through their whole lives, without ever really feeling that close with anyone."
"He wants to understand how her mind works."
The best quotes from Normal People on societal perceptions and expectations
"Generally I find men are a lot more concerned with limiting the freedoms of women than exercising personal freedom for themselves."
"Even the writer himself was a good person, and even if his book really was insightful, all books were ultimately marketed as status symbols, and all writers participated to some degree in this marketing."
"It was culture as class performance, literature fetishised for its ability to take educated people on false emotional journeys, so that they might afterwards feel superior to the uneducated people whose emotional journeys they liked to read about."
“It feels intellectually unserious to concern himself with fictional people marrying one another.”
"Connell wished he knew how other people conducted their private lives, so that he could copy from example."
"'I don't know what's wrong with me,' says Marianne. 'I don't know why I can't be like normal people.'"
"If people appeared to behave pointlessly in grief, it was only because human life was pointless, and this was the truth that grief revealed."
The best quotes from Normal People on life and being human
"Life is the thing you bring with you inside your own head."
"Marianne had the sense that her real life was happening somewhere very far away, happening without her, and she didn't know if she would ever find out where it was or become part of it."
"People are a lot more knowable than they think they are."
"Connell always gets what he wants, and then feels sorry for himself when what he wants doesn't make him happy."
"It was so much harder to reconcile herself to the idea of helping a few, like she would rather help no one than do something so small and feeble."
"It suggests to Connell that the same imagination he used as a reader is necessary to understand real people also, and to be intimate with them."
"It feels powerful to him to put an experience down in words, like he's trapping it in a jar and it can never fully leave him."
"It's funny the decisions you make because you like someone, he says, and then your whole life is different."
“There are so many doors to open. I am impatient to begin."
"Life offers up these moments of joy despite everything."
“She has never believed herself fit to be loved by any person. But now she has a new life, of which this is the first moment, and even after many years have passed she will still think: Yes, that was it, the beginning of my life."
