The world's very small when you don't have anywhere to go.

Truth is, only the useless get to the top in this country.

Every work of art is aggressive, Isabella. And every artist's life is a small war or a large one, beginning with oneself and one's limitations. To achieve anything you must first have ambition and then talent, knowledge, and finally the opportunity.

They had parted as boys, and now life presented one of them with a fugitive and the other with a dying man. Both wondered whether this was due to the cards they'd been dealt or to the way they had played them.

But in good time you'll see that sometimes what matters isn't what one gives but what one gives up.

Time has taught me not to lose hope, yet not to trust too much in hope either.

Never trust girls who let themselves be touched right away. But even less those who need a priest for approval.