How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
This was Colin's first memory: his dad slowly lowering the paper and smiling at him. His dad's eyes were wide with surprise and pleasure, and his smile was uncontainable. "CINDY! THE BOY IS READING THE PAPER!" he shouted. (3.30)
It's important for us to hear where it all began: the very first memory that Colin has. For most of us it's something silly we did as a kid, but for Colin it's a significant moment in forming who he is today. His whole identity can be traced back to this moment when he became a child prodigy.
Quote #2
He felt the thrill of it surge through him, his eyes blinking fast as he fought to remember the idea in its completeness. Lying there on his back in the sticky, thick air, the Eureka moment felt like a thousand orgasms all at once, except not as messy. (6.2)
This is one of the new memories that Colin forms throughout the book. We're so used to seeing him look back on his life that we're excited when he finally wants to join us in the present. But his thoughts are still on remembering—it's just the process instead of the past memories that excite him this time.
Quote #3
He would use his past—and the Archduke's past, and the whole endless past—to inform the future. He would impress Katherine XIX—she had always loved the idea of him being a genius—and he would make the world safer to Dumpees everywhere. He would matter. (7.7)
Sure the past and the future are always connected, but Colin wants to highlight that connection by creating his theorem. It's partly that he wants a eureka moment, but it's also that he wants his past to amount to something.
Quote #4
"What we're doing," she spoke quickly, "is we're putting together an oral history of Gutshot, for future generations. I've been pulling people off the line to do interviews for a couple of weeks, but I ain't gotta now that you're here. Anyway, the downfall of this whole operation so far has been gossip—everybody chattering 'bout what everyone else says or doesn't say. But y'all don't have a reason in the world to talk about whether or not Ellie Mae liked her husband when she married him in 1937. So—it's you two." (8.30)
As Hollis tells the boys about her project, we learn that it's not just Colin who's interested in memories—Hollis wants to preserve the collective memory of the town for future generations. All this gets Shmoop to thinking: is there a difference between what Hollis is trying to do (catalog memories) and what Colin does (remember the Katherines)?
Quote #5
"You and me will read a book and find like three interesting things that we remember. But Colin finds everything intriguing. He reads a book about presidents and he remembers more of it because everything he reads clicks in his head as fugging interesting. Honestly, I've seen him do it with the phone book. He'll be like, 'Oh, there are twenty-four listings for Tischler. How fascinating.'" (9.89)
Thanks to Hassan here, we get a look at how Colin's brain works: his memories are so important to him because it's part of what he does and who he is. He likes to read and remember, and then read some more. We all have a favorite memory, but Colin tries to remember everything.
Quote #6
Do you ever wonder whether people would like you more or less if they could see inside you? I mean, I've always felt like the Katherines dump me right when they start to see what I look like from the inside—well, except K-19. But I always wonder about that. If people could see me the way I see myself—if they could live in my memories—would anyone, anyone, love me? (14.52)
If they've got a ticket to someone's memories, we're in. It's such an amazing and weird way to think about what we know about each other. There's the past that we tell people and then there's our memory of it, and sometimes those two things just don't line up.
Quote #7
Colin leaned back against the rotten tree, his back arching over it until he was staring at the cloudy sky. Betrayed by his vaunted memory! He had, indeed, remarked eighteen and snubbed the rest. How could he remember everything about her and not remember that he dumped her? (15.84)
Good question, Colin. This is a big revelation to him because he's spent his whole life remembering the Katherines one way, only to discover he's been wrong. It makes us wonder whether anything he remembers about the Katherines is really true. How much can we trust his memories if some of them aren't real?
Quote #8
Above him, the interweaving branches seemed to split the sky into a million little pieces. He felt like he had vertigo. The one facility he'd always trusted—memory—was a fraud. And he might have gone on thinking about it for hours, or at least until Mr. Lyford returned, except at that very moment he heard a weird grunting noise and simultaneously felt Hassan's hand tap his knee. (15.88)
We'd like to point out that to Colin, his memory is the most important thing about him—it defines him. Yet, he can't trust it because it's a phony. It's funny that he's critical of Lindsey playing different parts (ditzy, southern, nerdy) because in a way he's done the same thing. He's chalked himself up to be this collection of memories, but they are not real.
Quote #9
Well, or to be forgotten, because someday no one will know who's really buried there. Already a lot of kids at school and stuff think the Archduke is really buried here, and I like that. I like knowing one story and having everyone else know another. That's why those tapes we made are going to be so great one day, because they'll tell stories that time has swallowed up or distorted or whatever. (19.57)
Who is really buried in the Archduke's grave might seem like a random twist in the story, but it helps us think about how fickle memory is for everyone. The new generation of Gutshoters don't even know what they are being told is a lie, so they form a memory on a "fact" that is not true in the first place. It's the same with Colin's mind remembering something that's not true.
Quote #10
"And the moral of the story is that you don't remember what happened. What you remember becomes what happened. And the second moral of the story, if a story can have multiple morals, is that Dumpers are not inherently worse than Dumpees—breaking up isn't something that gets done to you; it's something that happens with you." (19.91)
Eureka—Colin finally realizes his memories have a story of their own. His memory becomes what happened between him and the Katherines, because he has nothing else to go on, and that's exactly why he shouldn't put too much stock in them. They aren't real or true, and they can change over time.