[The captain] looked at Florentino Ariza, his invincible power, his intrepid love and was overwhelmed by the belated suspicion that it is life, more than death, that has no limits.

He who awaits much can expect little.

he dared to explore her withered neck w/his fingertips…her hips w/their decaying bones, her thighs with their aging veins.

She searched the truth with an anguish almost as great as her terrible fear of finding it .

If you're going to be a writer you have to be one of the great ones... After all, there are better ways to starve to death.

There was no sleeper more elegant than she, with her curved body posed for a dance and her hand across her forehead, but there was also no one more ferocious when anyone disturbed the sensuality of her thinking she was still asleep when she no longer was.

She would defend herself, saying that love, no matter what else it might be, was a natural talent. She would say: You are either born knowing how, or you never know.