Myths are the prototype for all stories. When we write a story on our own it can't help but link up with all sorts of myths. Myths are like a reservoir containing every story there is.

And as the years have passed, the time has grown longer. The sad truth is that what I could recall in five seconds all too needed ten, then thirty, then a full minute - like shadows lengthening at dusk. Someday, I suppose, the shadows will be swallowed up in darkness.

No truth can cure the sorrow we feel from losing a loved one. No truth, no sincerity, no strength, no kindness can cure that sorrow. All we can do is see it through to the end and learn something from it, but what we learn will be no help in facing the next sorrow that comes to us without warning.

After all this, I won't start to hate you.

I am a flawed human being - a far more flawed human being than you realize.

This is the extent of his knowledge of the sea: it was very big, it was salty, and fish lived there.

It is sometimes necessary for each person. Fill up with delicious food, get drunk, sing loudly and chat frivolously.