Claustrophobia Quotes

“Flakes of snow swirled and danced across the porch. The Overlook faced it as it had for nearly three-quarters of a century, its darkened windows now bearded with snow, indifferent to the fact it was now cut off from the world… Inside its shell the three of them went about their early evening routine, like microbes trapped in the intestine of a monster.”
― Stephen King, The Shining

“Darkness is a strange thing — it is both infinite and confining; it holds you tight in its grasp, but it holds you suspended in a void. Silence operates in a similar way. Slowly the two combine to become a threat.

("Come Into My Parlour")”
― Reggie Oliver

“He had been haunted his whole life by a mild
case of claustrophobia—the vestige of a childhood incident he had never quite overcome.
Langdon’s aversion to closed spaces was by no means debilitating, but it had always frustrated him.
It manifested itself in subtle ways. He avoided enclosed sports like racquetball or squash, and he had
gladly paid a small fortune for his airy, high-ceilinged Victorian home even though economical faculty
housing was readily available. Langdon had often suspected his attraction to the art world as a young
boy sprang from his love of museums’ wide open spaces.”
― Dan Brown, Angels & Demons

“But then I remembered: the universe was closed, and so very small. There was really nowhere else to go.”
― Peter Watts, Blindsight

“I have to get off this elevator.
I can't ride with him,
Can't look at him,
Can't be this close to him.
Can't,
Can't,
can't.”
― Elana Johnson, Elevated

“¿Estás perdiendo la cabeza?
-Dímelo tú
No puedo
-¿Por qué?
Porque yo soy tú”
― Blake Crouch, Pines

“When I hit thirty, he brought me a cake,
three layers of icing, home-made,
a candle for each stone in weight.
The icing was white but the letters were pink,
they said, EAT ME. And I ate, did
what I was told. Didn’t even taste it.
Then he asked me to get up and walk
round the bed so he could watch my broad
belly wobble, hips judder like a juggernaut.
The bigger the better, he’d say, I like
big girls, soft girls, girls I can burrow inside
with multiple chins, masses of cellulite.
I was his Jacuzzi. But he was my cook,
my only pleasure the rush of fast food,
his pleasure, to watch me swell like forbidden fruit.
His breadfruit. His desert island after shipwreck.
Or a beached whale on a king-sized bed
craving a wave. I was a tidal wave of flesh.
too fat to leave, too fat to buy a pint of full-fat milk,
too fat to use fat as an emotional shield,
too fat to be called chubby, cuddly, big-built.
The day I hit thirty-nine, I allowed him to stroke
my globe of a cheek. His flesh, my flesh flowed.
He said, Open wide, poured olive oil down my throat.
Soon you’ll be forty… he whispered, and how
could I not roll over on top. I rolled and he drowned
in my flesh. I drowned his dying sentence out.
I left him there for six hours that felt like a week.
His mouth slightly open, his eyes bulging with greed.
There was nothing else left in the house to eat.”
― Patience Agbabi, Poems of the Decade: An Anthology of the Forward Books of Poetry

“Tamlin's claws punched out. 'Even if I risked it, you're untrained abilities render your presence more of a liability than anything.'

It was like being hit with stones- so hard I could feel myself cracking. But I lifted my chin and said, 'I'm coming along whether you want me to or not.'

'No, you aren't.' He strode right through the door, his claws slashing the air at his sides, and was halfway down the steps before I reached the threshold.

Where I slammed into an invisible wall.

I staggered back, trying to reorder my mind around the impossibility of it. It was identical to the one I'd built that day in the study, and I searched inside the shards of my soul, my heart, for a tether to that shield, wondering if I'd blocked myself, but- there was no power emanating from me.

I reached a hand to the open air of the doorway. And met solid resistance.

'Tamlin,' I rasped.

But he was already down the front drive, walking towards the looming iron gates. Lucien remained at the foot of the stairs, his face so, so pale.

'Tamlin,' I said again, pushing against the wall.

He didn't turn.

I slammed my hand into the invisible barrier. No movement- nothing but hardened air. And I had not learned about my own powers enough to try to push through, to shatter it... I had let him convince me not to learn those things for his sake-

'Don't bother trying,' Lucien said softly, as Tamlin cleared the gates and vanished- winnowed. 'He shielded the entire house around you. Others can go in and out, but you can't. Not until he lifts the shield.'

He'd locked me in here.

I hit the shield again. Again.

Nothing.

'Just- be patient, Feyre,' Lucien tried, wincing as he followed after Tamlin. 'Please. I'll see what I can do. I'll try again.'

I barely heard him over the roar in my ears. Didn't wait to see him pass the gates and winnow, too.

He'd locked me in. He'd sealed me inside the house.

I hurtled for the nearest window in the foyer and shoved it open. A cool spring breeze rushed in- and I shoved my hand through it- only for my fingers to bounce off an invisible wall. Smooth, hard air pushed against my skin.

Breathing became difficult.

I was trapped.

I was trapped inside this house. I might as well have been Under the Mountain. I might as well have been inside that cell again-

I backed away, my steps too light, too fast, and slammed into the oak table in the centre of the foyer. None of the nearby sentries came to investigate.

He'd trapped me in here; he'd locked me up.

I stopped seeing the marble floor, or the paintings on the walls, or the sweeping staircase looming behind me. I stopped hearing the chirping of the spring birds, or the sighing of the breeze through the curtains.

And then crushing black pounded down and rose up beneath, devouring and roaring and shredding.

It was all I could do to keep from screaming, to keep from shattering into ten thousand pieces as I sank onto the marble floor, bowing over my knees, and wrapped my arms around myself.

He'd trapped me; he'd trapped me; he'd trapped me-

I had to get out, because I'd barely escaped from another prison once before, and this time, this time-

Winnowing. I could vanish into nothing but air and appear somewhere else, somewhere open and free. I fumbled for my power, for anything, something that might show me the way to do it, the way out. Nothing. There was nothing and I had become nothing, and I couldn't even get out-

Someone was shouting my name from far away.

Alis- Alis.

But I was ensconced in a cocoon of darkness and fire and ice and wind, a cocoon that melted the ring off my finger until the folden ore dripped away into the void, the emerald tumbling after it. I wrapped that raging force around myself as if it could keep the walls from crushing me entirely, and maybe, maybe buy me the tiniest sip of air-

I couldn't get out; I couldn't get out; I couldn't get out-”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Mist and Fury

“Two weeks of thinking I’d sort it out tomorrow, what came next. Eating crisps in bed or in the bath and getting a headache from all the salt. Daytime telly on as if it can keep you warm—the kind that lets you know there’s worse things than death. There’s nowt so dangerous as a room with no view. Started seeing things in the popcorn ceiling. Every sad bastard thought come to life, stretching near forty years, and they went on and on, filling the room like a leaking oven, finding a gap under the door and flooding out till my head felt the size of the world.”
― Scott Preston, The Borrowed Hills

“Wegens de krapte zijn de meeste kinderen en jongeren geneigd om veel, talrijk en langdurig op straat te hangen, anders kibbelen ze met de divisie thuis, ledigheid is immers des duivels oorkussen, of ondervinden ze hinder van de ouders die ongevraagd je kamer binnenstormen (kloppen doen we niet aan bij ons, privacy evenmin) en vervolgens jou voor klaagmuur aanzien en beginnen te raaskallen over alles waar ze hun ei of zaad over kwijt moeten, meestal familiaire aangelegenheden, financieel noodweer, huwelijks gesodemieter, en anders over eventuele rommel in je kamer. Ze komen je vragen om de post voor ze te vertalen en allerlei formulieren in te vullen en worden ook nog boos en verwijtend als je dat niet kunt, zelfs al ben je nog kind. Ze eisen dat je naar de moskee gaat op vrijdag, vragen waarom je niet bidt, vragen wat je kijkt op de telefoon, vragen waarom je lacht als je op je beeldscherm kijkt, vragen met wie je belt en waarom dat klinkt als de stem van iemand van het andere geslacht of ze produceren gewoon heel veel geluid terwijl ze videobellen met familieleden, zowel uit het buiten- als binnenland, terwijl jij je moet concentreren op je huiswerk of gewoon niet blootgesteld wilt worden aan dat oeverloze gezwatel. Het ergste van alles is als er mensen onthaald worden en de visite zo lang blijft zetelen dat je je afvraagt of ze van plan zijn te blijven tukken. En dat gebeurt nogal frequent; op elk moment van de week kunnen ze ongegeneerd komen aankloppen en blijven tot je ze afwimpelt door opzichtig te gapen. Men zegt dat bezoek en vis drie dagen fris blijven, daar hadden ze bij de Turken nog geen notie van genomen. Of ze namen die drie dagen letterlijk.”
― Lale Gül, Ik ga leven

“I studied the stable behind him instead. At least it was big, open, the stable hands now off in another wing. I usually had little issue with being inside, which was mostly whenever I was bored enough to visit the horses housed within. Plenty of space to move, to escape. he walls didn't feel too... permanent.

Not like the kitchens, which were too low, the walls too thick, the windows not big enough to climb through. Not like the study, with not enough natural light or easy exits. I had a long list in my head of what places I could and couldn't endure at the manor, ranked by precisely how much they made my body luck up and sweat.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Mist and Fury

“I studied the stable behind him instead. At least it was big, open, the stable hands now off in another wing. I usually had little issue with being inside, which was mostly whenever I was bored enough to visit the horses housed within. Plenty of space to move, to escape. the walls didn't feel too... permanent.

Not like the kitchens, which were too low, the walls too thick, the windows not big enough to climb through. Not like the study, with not enough natural light or easy exits. I had a long list in my head of what places I could and couldn't endure at the manor, ranked by precisely how much they made my body luck up and sweat.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Mist and Fury

“Tamlin's claws punched out. 'Even if I risked it, you're untrained abilities render your presence more of a liability than anything.'

It was like being hit with stones- so hard I could feel myself cracking. But I lifted my chin and said, 'I'm coming along whether you want me to or not.'

'No, you aren't.' He strode right through the door, his claws slashing the air at his sides, and was halfway down the steps before I reached the threshold.

Where I slammed into an invisible wall.

I staggered back, trying to reorder my mind around the impossibility of it. It was identical to the one I'd built that day in the study, and I searched inside the shards of my soul, my heart, for a tether to that shield, wondering if I'd blocked myself, but- there was no power emanating from me.

I reached a hand to the open air of the doorway. And met solid resistance.

'Tamlin,' I rasped.

But he was already down the front drive, walking towards the looming iron gates. Lucien remained at the foot of the stairs, his face so, so pale.

'Tamlin,' I said again, pushing against the wall.

He didn't turn.

I slammed my hand into the invisible barrier. No movement- nothing but hardened air. And I had not learned about my own powers enough to try to push through, to shatter it... I had let him convince me not to learn those things for his sake-

'Don't bother trying,' Lucien said softly, as Tamlin cleared the gates and vanished- winnowed. 'He shielded the entire house around you. Others can go in and out, but you can't. Not until he lifts the shield.'

He'd locked me in here.

I hit the shield again. Again.

Nothing.

'Just- be patient, Feyre,' Lucien tried, wincing as he followed after Tamlin. 'Please. I'll see what I can do. I'll try again.'

I barely heard him over the roar in my ears. Didn't wait to see him pass the gates and winnow, too.

He'd locked me in. He'd sealed me inside the house.

I hurtled for the nearest window in the foyer and shoved it open. A cool spring breeze rushed in- and I shoved my hand through it- only for my fingers to bounce off an invisible wall. Smooth, hard air pushed against my skin.

Breathing became difficult.

I was trapped.

I was trapped inside this house. I might as well have been Under the Mountain. I might as well have been inside that cell again-

I backed away, my steps too light, too fast, and slammed into the oak table in the centre of the foyer. None of the nearby sentries came to investigate.

He'd trapped me in here; he'd locked me up.

I stopped seeing the marble floor, or the paintings on the walls, or the sweeping staircase looming behind me. I stopped hearing the chirping of the spring birds, or the sighing of the breeze through the curtains.

And then crushing black pounded down and rose up beneath, devouring and roaring and shredding.

It was all I could do to keep from screaming, to keep from shattering into ten thousand pieces as I sank onto the marble floor, bowing over my knees, and wrapped my arms around myself.

He'd trapped me; he'd trapped me; he'd trapped me-

I had to get out, because I'd barely escaped from another prison once before, and this time, this time-

Winnowing. I could vanish into nothing but air and appear somewhere else, somewhere open and free. I fumbled for my power, for anything, something that might show me the way to do it, the way out. Nothing. There was nothing and I had become nothing, and I couldn't even get out-

Someone was shouting my name from far away.

Alis- Alis.

But I was ensconced in a cocoon of darkness and fire and ice and wind, a cocoon that melted the ring off my finger until the golden ore dripped away into the void, the emerald tumbling after it. I wrapped that raging force around myself as if it could keep the walls from crushing me entirely, and maybe, maybe buy me the tiniest sip of air-

I couldn't get out; I couldn't get out; I couldn't get out-”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Mist and Fury

“I doubted the stone and iron of the building could hold any of us, certainly not together, but... Letting them shut us in here to wait... It rubbed against some nerve. Made my body restless, a cold sweat breaking out. Too small, not enough air...

It's all right, Rhys soothed. This place cannot hold you.

I nodded, though he hadn't spoken, trying to swallow the feeling of the walls and ceiling pushing on me.

Nesta was watching me carefully. I admitted to her, 'Sometimes... I have problems with small spaces.'

Nesta studied me for a long moment. And then she said with equal quiet, though we could all hear, 'I can't get into a bathtub anymore. I have to use buckets.'

I hadn't known- hadn't even thought that bathing, submerging in water...

I knew better than to touch her hand. But I said, 'When we get home, we'll install something else for you.'

I could have sworn there was gratitude in her eyes- that she might have said something else when horses approached.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A Court of Wings and Ruin

“He shuddered at the idea of digging beneath the surface. It would be stifling, hot, filthy, and dangerous. The ferrets also occasionally commandeered a heavy truck, loaded it with men and material, and drove it, bouncing along, around the outside perimeter of the camp. They believed the weight would cause any underground tunnel to collapse. Once, more than a year earlier, they'd been right. He remembered the fury on Colonel MacNamara's face when the long days and nights of hard work were so summarily crushed.”
― John Katzenbach, Hart's War

“Ah wants you always, John. Fo' I fear. I fear."

He understood. He lifted his hand a little to stroke hers.

"But Mammy, ef the cabin 'n' the swamp is chokin' me?"

"Chokin's our life." Her voice is harsh.”
― Waldo Frank, Holiday

“It begins when you pop your headlamp, illuminating the perpetual darkness of the abyss.”
― Dark Night Beacon