Americans have discovered the fragility of life, that ominous fragility that the rest of the world either already experienced or is experiencing now with terrible intensity.

Ah, in every age there is always some new wonder to astound mankind until they grow accustomed to it and lose interest.

Death ... doesn't take her eyes off us for a minute, so much so that even those who are not yet due to die feel her gaze pursuing them constantly.

If I'm sincere today, what does it matter if I regret it tomorrow?

Sleep is a skilled magician, it changes the proportions of things, the distances between them, it separates people and they're lying next to each other, brings them together and they can barely see one another.

As so often happens, the thing left undone tires you most of all, you only feel rested when it has been accomplished.

I had no books at home. I started to frequent a public library in Lisbon. It was there, with no help except curiosity and the will to learn, that my taste for reading developed and was refined.