Seeing him again after so long awakened something inside me. I was surprised to find myself feeling sad rather than joyful, as I would have imagined.

All at once I felt so vain, like a girl posturing for the crowds as she walks along, only to discover the street is empty.

Friendship is a precious thing, Sayuri. One mustn't throw it away.

Water is powerful. It can wash away earth, put out fire, and even destroy iron.

As an American man of the 1990s writing about a Japanese woman of the 1930s, I needed to cross three cultural divides - man to woman, American to Japanese, and present to past.

Finally the homeless eel marked its territory, I suppose, and the Doctor lay heavily upon me, moist with sweat.

This is why dreams can be such dangerous things: they smolder on like a fire does, and sometimes they consume us completely.