Keenness of hearing revives when one is alone.

Everyone ends up moving alone towards the self

About the joys and the courage, I really don't know what other people think. I just know that I've never left Africa. I've lived there all my life. And one of the wonderful things, in spite of all the terrible things that happen in South Africa, is the way people continue to keep their dignity.

what a writer does is to try to make sense of life. I think that's what writing is, I think that's what painting is. It's seeking that thread of order and logic in the disorder, and the incredible waste and marvelous profligate character of life. What all artists are trying to do is to make sense of life.

The gap between the committed and the indifferent is a Sahara whose faint trails, followed by the mind's eye only, fade out in sand.

Writing is making sense of life. You work your whole life and perhaps you've made sense of one small area.

The solitude of writing is also quite frightening. It's quite close to madness, one just disappears for a day and loses touch.