Eileen, Ottessa Moshfegh NOTES

 Chapter 1 "1964"

Summary of Chapter 1:

Ottessa uses gruesome and violent imaging to introduce the character and her troubled mind. Metaphors and similes tell us that Eileen is a disturbed young woman which an alcoholic father. It is also mentioned that she has a sister who is no longer in the picture. The chapter finishes with present-day Eileen saying that the book will be about how she runs away from home and never returns. 

QUOTES

• "I was thin, my figure was jagged, my movements pointy and hesitant, my posture stiff"- Moshfegh uses adjectives that are not usually used for a person but instead something like a knife or blade. It is the beginning of disturbing imagery. 
• "It (snow) sat staunchly in every front yard, rolled out at the lip of every first floor windowsill like a flood"
• "cracking and darting through my breasts, slicing through the thick gristle of my shoulder like bullets or cleaving my brain into pieces"
• "fruitless"- in this context it is used to mean advantageous.
• "The idea that my brains could be untangled, straightened out, and thus refashioned into a state of peace and sanity was a comforting fantasy".
• "moony"- meaning dreamy and unaware of one's surroundings. 
• "I was a glutton for punishment"
• "It would have soared down my throat, scraping the vacuous center of my body...followed through to my guts, finally parting my nether regions like a glass dagger"
• "How odd is it that liquor never freezes. It was the one thing in that place that simply refused the cold"- Perhaps Eileen is drawing parallels between how alcohol never freezes and her father's relentless alcoholism.

Chapter 2 "Friday"

Summary of Chapter 2

Eileen goes on to describe her life as a prison guard and the characters she works with. We are introduced to Randy who she has a crush on yet never acts upon it. Eileen also mentions Rebecca for the first time. 

QUOTES

• "I truly felt that the inside of my mouth was such a private area, caverns, and folds of wet parting flesh, that letting anyone see into it was just as bad as spreading my legs"- One should note how Eileen frequently relates many things back to sex and describes her distaste for it. She is prudish but cannot help herself from forming an obsession crush and fantasy about Randy.