For a second I was almost jealous of the clouds. Why was he looking to them for an escape when I was right here beside him?

I still hear the world spinning.

How to explain to the earth that it was more functional as a vegetable patch than a flower garden, just as factories were more functional than schools and boys were more functional as weapons than as humans.

Love is like an eternal flame, once it is lit, it will continue to burn for all time.

When you can be this, why are you ever anything else? - Broken Verses

No self-respecting feminist could argue with the claim that the novel is more likely to accept existing power structures than not. But there's a vast difference, surely, between Dickens saying Indians should be exterminated and a Dave Eggers writing eloquently about the NSA, but not being as outspoken on American military power abroad.

That's what I want for my life. I want to go to Peshawar... Because there's more past than present there. Two and a half thousand years of history beneath its soil. How long a list of reasons do you need?