I was the place where you anchored. I was the deep water where you could be weightless. I was the surface where you saw your own reflection. You scooped me up in your hands.

I think every work of art is an act of faith, or we wouldn't bother to do it. It is a message in a bottle, a shout in the dark. It's saying, 'I'm here and I believe that you are somewhere and that you will answer if necessary across time, not necessarily in my lifetime.'

Why should literature be easy? Sometimes you can do what you want to do in a simple, direct way that is absolutely right. Sometimes you can't. Reading is not a passive act. Books are not TV. Art of all kinds is an interactive challenge. The person who makes the work and the person who comes to the work both have a job to do. I am never wilfully obscure, but I do ask for some effort.

Time that withers you will wither me. We will fall like ripe fruit and roll down the grass together. Dear friend, let me lie beside you watching the clouds until the earth covers us and we are gone.

Love is the one thing stronger than desire and the only proper reason to resist temptation.

Our own front door can be a wonderful thing, or a sight we dread; rarely is it only a door.

Capacity for love in its higher forms seems to be peculiarly human although even in humans it is still peculiar.