The spark of true poetry flashes when ideas are juxtaposed that no one has yet thought of bringing together.
J. M. CoetzeeWords are coin. Words alienate. Language is no medium for desire. Desire is rapture, not exchange.
J. M. CoetzeeSleep is no longer a healing bath, a recuperation of vital forces, but an oblivion, a nightly brush with annihilation.
J. M. CoetzeeMy existence from day to day has become a matter of averting my eyes, of cringing. Death is the only truth left. Death is what I cannot bear to think. At every moment when I am thinking of something else, I am not thinking death, am not thinking the truth.
J. M. CoetzeeSpeaking the words he had been taught, directing them no longer upward but to the earth on which he knelt, he prayed: 'For what we are about to receive make us truly thankful.' ... he... felt his heart suddenly flow over with thankfulness... like a gush of warm water... All that remains is to live here quietly for the rest of my life, eating food that my own labour has made the earth to yield. All that remains is to be a tender of the soil.
J. M. Coetzee