Verona is a very beautiful city, but Siena just never ceases to fascinate me.

You were right and I was wrong. When life hurts more than death, it is not worth living.

She laughed out loud, a warm, knowing laughter that made me once again wonder about the secret ingredient in these women’s lives. Whatever it was, I was clearly missing it. It was so much more than just self-confidence; it seemed to be the ability to love oneself, enthusiastically and unsparingly, body and soul, naturally followed by the assumption that every man on the planet is dying to get in on the act.

Think about it. He drinks poison. What kind of man drinks poison? She is the one who stabs herself with his dagger. The manly way.

Everything we say is a story. But nothing we say is just a story.

After the dress rehearsal that afternoon, someone had misplaced the vial of poison, and for lack of better, Romeo would have to commit suicide by eating Tic Tacs.

While at Oxford in 1999, I met Jonathan Fortier, who is a Montreal-born Canadian. Despite the challenges of a transatlantic relationship, we remained keen on each other and eventually married in 2002.