A letter is a barrier, a reprieve, a charm against the world, an almost infallible method of acting at a distance.
Iris MurdochWhen does one ever know a human being? Perhaps only after one has realized the impossibility of knowledge and renounced the desire for it and finally ceased to feel even the need of it. But then what one achieves is no longer knowledge, it is simply a kind of co-existence; and this too is one of the guises of love.
Iris MurdochThe absolute yearning of one human body for another particular body and its indifference to substitutes is one of life's major mysteries.
Iris Murdoch