We could imagine all sorts of universes unlike this one, but this is the one that happened.

We live in a world made up more of story than stuff. We are creatures of memory more than reminders, of love more than likes. Being attentive to the needs of others might not be the point of life, but it is the work of life. It can be messy, and painful, and almost impossibly difficult. But it is not something we give. It is what we get in exchange for having to die.

The French, who love their dogs, sometimes eat their horses. The Spanish, who love their horses, sometimes eat their cows. The Indians, who love their cows, sometimes eat their dogs.

It can be challenge enough to have to eat with myself.

It will never be the case that people won't eat meat. I think it could conceivably be the case one day that people eat very small amounts of it. That it's a special thing, rather than reach for it because it's cheap or reach for it because it's convenient, that it becomes something festive or something celebratory, once a week, and that could actually be achieved on small farms if we really changed our habits.

Jed Perl writes precisely and ecstatically. Antoine' s Alphabet is a history and a fairy tale, a work of criticism, and a work of art.

I wanted to touch him, to tell him that even if everyone left everyone, I would never leave him, he talked and talked, his words fell through him, trying to find the floor to his sadness.