One can be in love with several people at the same time, feel the sorrow with each, and not betray any of them.

Life in the world... was nothing more than a system of atavistic contracts, banal ceremonies, preordained words, with which people entertained each other in society in order not to commit murder. The dominant sign in that paradise of provincial frivolity was fear of the unknown.

[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.

Surrealism comes from the reality of Latin America.

When he went through the kitchen he kissed Rebeca on the forehead. "Get those bad thoughts out of your head," he told her. "You're going to be happy.

There had never been a death so foretold.

and realized that death was not only a permanent probability, as he had always believed, but an immediate reality.