Adrift in the Brookner Universe

I read Anita Brookner's Undue Influence (for the second time) quite recently. Perhaps this wasn't the right move. Her heroines remind me too much of myself.

I was resigned to the laws of this rough world. I would take my chance, and with it the penalties, for there are always penalties. I had spent that morbid Sunday wondering if simple happiness were available to all and had come to the conclusion that it was not. One had to make a determined bid for it, and I did not quite know how this was done.

Even the most subtle explanations could not convince me that some lives, and not others, are destined to be unfulfilled.

But there is always something to look forward to, if you live long enough:

'Mark you, old age has something to be said for it. You can ignore all health warnings, for one thing. You can drink, smoke, take pills, eat butter, lie in the sun; it doesn't matter a damn. My life took on a new meaning when I decided to devote it to idle degeneracy.'