I have been writing in spurts, bit by bit. It is incredibly difficult. Everything is corroded, broken, dismantled; everything is covered with hardened layers of accumulated insensitivity, deafness, entrenched routine. It is disgusting.

And why is it, thought Lara, that my fate is to see everything and take it all so much to heart?

I used to be very revolutionary, but now I think that nothing can be gained by brute force. People must be drawn to good by goodness.

... the unarmed power of naked truth.

Surprise is the greatest gift which life can grant us.

Salvation lies not in the faithfulness to forms, but in the liberation from them.

We're all time's captives, hostages to eternity.