It was, at last, real life, with my heart safe and condemned to die of happy love in the joyful agony of any day after my hundredth birthday.

A true friend is the one who holds your hand and touches your heart.

Humanity, like armies in the field, advances at the speed of the slowest.

There was a house at the foot of the tower, close to the thunder of the waves breaking against the cliffs, where love was more intense because it seemed like a shipwreck.

An artisan without memories, whose only dream was to die of fatigue in the oblivion and misery of his little gold fishes.

An ash-gray dog with a white blaze on its forehead burst onto the rough terrain of the market on the first Sunday in December, knocked down tables of fried food, overturned Indians' stalls and lottery kiosks, and bit four people who happened to cross its path.

For you was I born, for you do I have life, for you will I die, for you am I now dying.