It is better to be passionate than to be tolerant at the expense of one's soul.

There are, I sometimes think, only two sorts of people in this world - the settled and the nomad - and there is a natural antipathy between them, whatever the land to which they may belong.

... there are few things that can reconcile us fully to our parting with a world of which the longest life can see so little and whose beauties have so extraordinary a variety.

... freshness trembles beneath the surface of Everyday, a joy perpetual to all who catch its opal lights beneath the dust of habit.

The past is our treasure. Its works, whether we know them or not, flourish in our lives with whatever strength they had. From it we draw provision for our journey, the collected wisdom whose harvests are all ours to reap and carry with us, though we may never live again in the fields that grew them.

I first noticed how the sound of water is like the talk of human voices, and would sometimes wake in the night and listen, thinking that a crowd of people were coming through the woods.

I feel like a divorced wife once my book is published and has left me, and hate to be brought back into intimate contact!