Taxi Driver Travis Bickle Quotes

It shouldn't make any difference, but Friday and Saturday nights are the worst. They're the worst because the loneliness is magnified. The best you can do is hope that there is someone else like you out there, but if there is, you will never meet this person because she doesn't get out either. So, you're left with your thoughts, and your thoughts are living people in your brain who call and hang up and lounge around like armed security guards who happen to be beautiful. In between these thoughts, you think about what's going on out there. The girl of your dreams is being ravaged by a man who doesn't have a care in the world. Just to hear her voice would make you happy for a week, but he gets to spend the day and night with her and thinks nothing of it. (…), there are boyfriends and girlfriends, people in love, wide awake. They hang out. They hang out. They hang out. They do nothing worthwhile except each other. Friends, friends, friends. Fiends. Inside jokes. There are so many stupid conversations going on right now. You could be having a meaningful conversation with a taxi driver. You could talk to him about how Travis Bickle's taxi was a metaphor for loneliness. (…) You have a gray tint on your contact lenses. But you have your work. They don't have that. They are cowards. Everyone seems so afraid to be alone. It takes strength to lie there alone and take it. They just want to copulate, and that's their biggest concern of the night. You want a tragedy. An assassination. A massacre. An earthquake. A city falling to the ground. Something to get the people on TV to be on the same page as you.

Sang Penari— (Intertextual Reconstruction) II. Tarian Terakhir Hari pertama ia hadir, seperti hari yang tak pernah berakhir: menghitung sisa uang mengulang adegan Travis Bickle dalam Taxi Driver, mempertaruhkan semuanya di atas dua dadu yang berdenyut seperti tali nasib. Harapan kuning keemasan, di atas angka dua belas, angka tertinggi— ia menari seperti Salome yang menuntut kepala Yohanes dalam satu putaran rahasia. Lompatan dua kaki membentuk tarian misteri, melampaui bintang-bintang, melampaui tubuhnya sendiri: seperti Frida Kahlo yang menari dengan tulang punggung retak namun tetap memaksa hidup memandangnya. Potret kemasyhuran di dinding, berkejaran seperti hantu Billie Holiday, dalam segelas sampanye bersama Marilyn Monroe yang tersenyum tepat sebelum runtuh. Ia mengejar audisi seperti seseorang yang mengejar Tuhan di lorong-lorong sempit Kafka. Makin dekat dengan kenyataan: Menari… seakan esok tubuhnya tak sanggup lagi berdiri. Menari… seperti setiap helaan napas mungkin adalah yang terakhir. Ia menerjemahkan dirinya serupa rembulan perak Virginia Woolf yang suatu hari meninggalkan jejak di permukaan air. Mata kehijauan seperti telaga Nostradamus yang memantulkan firasat kematian. Rambut menyala seperti api— bintang kejora yang akan padam sebelum fajar mengenal namanya. Seekor angsa elok di antara para penari lain, namun kita tahu bagaimana nasib angsa dalam dongeng Andersen: keindahan selalu menjadi kutuk sekaligus mahkota. Meja panjang dengan hidangan asing, bahasa yang tak sepenuhnya ia pahami— seakan ia adalah tokoh Haruki Murakami yang tersesat dalam realitas paralel antara igau seekor kucing dan rembulan yang menangis. Ia bukan menulis puisi, ia sedang menulis obituari: riwayat singkat seorang penari muda yang mati saat mengejar mimpinya— seperti tokoh Son Mi-451 di Cloud Atlas yang mati dalam usaha membebaskan diri dari sistem yang mencabiknya jadi serpihan. Kisah penuh luka, kisah tanpa akhir bahagia: nirwana yang tak pernah ia capai, walau ia sudah menari dengan sepenuh hati, seluruh tubuh, seluruh trauma, seluruh jiwa. Agustus 2025