It never occurred to me that our lives, until then so closely interwoven, could unravel and separate over a thing like that. But the fact was, I suppose, there were powerful tides tugging us apart by then, and it only needed something like that to finish the task. If we'd understood that back then-who knows?-maybe we'd have kept a tighter hold of one another.

She always wanted to believe in things.

She might be a great person, but life's so much bigger than just loving someone.

What is pertinent is the calmness of that beauty, its sense of restraint.

I like novelists who can create other interesting worlds.

Perhaps there are those who are able to go about their lives unfettered by such concerns. But for those like us, our fate is to face the world as orphans, chasing through long years the shadows of vanished parents. There is nothing for it but to try and see through our missions to the end, as best we can, for until we do so, we will be permitted no calm.

I have the feeling of this completely alternative person I should have become. There was another life that I might have had, but I’m having this one.