How we cite our quotes: (Chapter. Paragraph)
Quote #1
Your set of hand-blown green glass dishes with the tiny bubbles and imperfections, little bits of sand, proof they were crafted by the honest, simple, hard-working indigenous aboriginal peoples of wherever [...] (5.16)
Don't forget that our narrator owns these dishes. The Tyler side of his personality abhors people who exploit simple, hard-working people, but the other side owns these symbols of a society that does exactly that. Could that be why Tyler blew up the apartment?
Quote #2
The things you used to own, now they own you. (5.57)
This is what we like to call a turning point. Our narrator doesn't feel like a part of society anymore. Instead, he's feeling controlled by society. And by the end of this chapter, he has blown up his apartment, and fight club has been born.
Quote #3
"The job will stoke your class hatred." (8.28)
Who hasn't had this kind of job? Tyler's job at the Pressman Hotel could easily be any kind of menial labor job catering to the rich and famous.
Quote #4
Here at cockroach level [...] titans and their gigantic wives drink barrels of champagne and bellow at each other wearing diamonds bigger than I feel. (10.6)
Stuck in an elevator, our narrator and Tyler are at foot level to the rich people who tower above them. It's a very 99% vs. 1% scene, with the feeling that the 1% could stomp on the 99% at any moment.
Quote #5
The doctors and everyone were so excited because they thought you had this new cancer. (13.22)
What is this line commenting on? Health care? Self-worth? Something totally different? Having a rare disease makes a person pretty valuable in the medical community, as morbid as that might be.
Quote #6
"You don't care where I live or how I feel, or what I eat or how I feed my kids or how I pay the doctor if I get sick, and yes I am stupid and bored and weak, but I am still your responsibility." (15.39)
Here Tyler goes again, speaking out about something that will always be a hot-button political issue. Should wealthy people help the less fortunate?
Quote #7
"Advertising has these people chasing cars and clothes they don't need. Generations have been working in jobs they hate, just so they can buy what they don't really need." (19.16)
According to Tyler, the way society functions didn't just happen. It was an orchestrated effort by people in power—a way to control people, to manufacture false wants and needs and keep them in line. Yowza.
Quote #8
"Imagine, when we call a strike and everyone refuses to work until we redistribute the wealth of the world." (19.20)
It's 1996, and Tyler Durden is talking about wealth redistribution. We're pretty sure this is a conversation that will never cease to get people going.
Quote #9
"The people you're trying to step on, we're everyone you depend on. We're the people who do your laundry and cook your food and serve your dinner. [...] We control every part of your life." (22.77)
Remember that working-class-as-cockroaches analogy? Here we go again: service workers are easy to step on but impossible to get rid of. Organized in an effort like Project Mayhem, they can be dangerous.
Quote #10
When deep-space exploitation ramps up, it will probably be the megatonic corporations that discover all the new planets and map them. [...] Every planet will take on the corporate identity of whoever rapes it first. (23.27, 31)
Well, this is extreme. Looks like there's no escape. Even when we all live on the moon, there will be mindless space monkeys.