Twenty years ago I might have hired a professional listener, but somewhere along the way I had lost faith in the talking cure. A genteel fraud in my view.

But to do its noticing and judging, poetry balances itself on the pinprick of the moment. Slowing down, stopping yourself completely, to read and understand a poem is like trying to acquire an old-fashioned skill.

All she had needed was the certainty of his love, and his reassurance that there was no hurry when a lifetime lay ahead of them.

Love doesn't grow at a steady rate, but advances in surges, bolts, wild leaps, and this was one of those.

I believe the novella is the perfect form of prose fiction.

The moment you lose curiosity in the world, you might as well be dead.

Imagining what it is like to be someone other than yourself is at the core of our humanity. It is the essence of compassion, and it is the beginning of morality.