For he was aware of the great secret of life: Women don't look for handsome men. Women look for men who have had beautiful women. Having an ugly mistress is therefore a fatal mistake.

He Kept recalling her lying on his bed; she reminded him of no one in his former life.

We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come.

[W]e must never allow the future to collapse under the burden of memory.

I have to lie, if I don't want to take madmen seriously and become a madman myself

And there lies the horror: the past we remember is devoid of time. Impossible to reexperience a love the way we reread a book or resee a film.

To rebel against being born a woman seemed as foolish to her as to take pride in it.