never forget this moment, the hum of the bee, the saffron threads of the flower, the drawn blinds, nature's assiduousness and human cruelty.

... a country encapsulates our childhood and those lanes, byres, fields, flowers, insects, suns, moons and stars are forever reoccurring.

Kindness. The most unkind thing of all.

There was I, devouring books and yet allowing a man who had never read a book to walk me home for a bit of harmless fumbling on the front steps.

Writers really live in the mind and in hotels of the soul.

It was the first time that I came face to face with madness and feared it and was fascinated by it.

Ideally I'd like to spend two evenings a week talking to Proust and another conversing with the Holy Ghost.