It was the silent time before dawn, along the shores of what had been one of the most beautiful lakes in southern Africa.

I have never thought of myself as a good writer. Anyone who wants reassurance of that should read one of my first drafts. But I'm one of the world's great rewriters.

The chief character in this narrative is the Caribbean Sea, one of the world's most alluring bodies of water, a rare gem among the oceans, defined by the islands that form a chain of lovely jewels to the north and east

You don't fight to protect warships or old men. Like the book says, you fight to save your civilization. And so often it seems that civilization is composed mainly of the things women and children want.

For this is the journey that men and women make, to find themselves. If they fail in this, it doesn't matter much else what they find.

It is difficult to be king when the gods are changing.

A poet sees things in two ways: First, as a child who never saw it before, and Second, as a dying man who will never see it again.