Being in Europe had helped me unlearn some of what I'd been taught or unconsciously believed.

The Dutch and the English, former competitors for world dominance, taught me the wisdom of waiting as well as withholding.

There are lots of unlikable characters in literature. It doesn't mean they're not fascinating.

I subject my sentences and the words to a kind of Grand Inquisition.

Laughing and crying are very similar. Sometimes people go from laughing to crying, or crying to laughing. I remember being at someone's wedding and she couldn't stop laughing, through the whole ceremony. If she'd been crying, it would have seemed more "normal," though.

My friends and I sometimes laugh at each other that there is so much maintenance of a body. I paid no attention when I was younger.

Obviously the Internet makes everything easier - you get people's addresses and so on and everything seems much more accessible.